Breakin' Convention 2024 Review ★★★★★

The queue to enter Sadler’s Wells for the 6 pm start of its sold out formal show on Saturday stretched far into the bowels of Islington and rarely did you see a more diverse audience, proof positive of the extraordinary reach of Breakin’ Convention.

Inside Sadler’s Wells, though, the actual festival had been going on since much earlier in the day, with the foyers of both the main house and the adjoining Lilian Baylis studio hosting beatbox performances and all manner of workshops for both children and adults on subjects key to hip hop culture, such as breaking and tagging.

Inside the auditorium, the first few rows of the stalls had been removed to make way for a packed mosh pit - according to Breakin’ Convention Artistic Director Jonzi D, the best way properly to appreciate hip hop is on your feet, so, boo to all of us sitting down… though we could still feel the vibrations of the propulsive music in our bodies and bop along to the contagious rhythm.

The show itself, warmely compered by Jonzi D himself, consisted of acts from both the UK and abroad, illustrating the mind-blowing variety of the styles that fall under the hip hop umbrella.

ShaolinOrShao, an eight-person crew from the UK, opened with MP3 + Movement Init, their own tribute to the UK grime culture.Good dancers all and impeccably coordinated, they retained an element of raw street culture that made their performance edgy and exciting.

ShaolinOrShao. Photo: Brandon Lee Anderson and Tyrese Luciano Mckenzie

From the Netherlands there came CREATE4, two men whose duet blended a variety of dance languages to build a narrative; but that was diffuse and the piece went on far too long.

Ekleido, from the UK, is made up of two women. Dressed in clingy metallic costumes, they performed Splice, a fascinating piece that explored the architecture of two bodies working together.

Krumping is the thing for the UK’s GBS, and thrilling it was, too; while Nottingham-based Jamal Skerrett used the Jamaican style bruk up, which co-opts elements of ballet to perform an enthralling piece exploring how Asperger’s syndrome heightens his sensitivity to external stimuli.

France’s Sons of Wind specialise in free style hip hop. Their number had long stretches of moshing and strutting around, breaking into high-energy ensemble numbers.

Part two started with a powerful performance by Traplord, the crew of Olivier Award winner Ivan Michael Blackstock. The Traplord universe is dark, its props - pig masks, guns, swinging spotlights occasionally directed at the public - symbolic of the pressures felt by young black urban men.This new episodic piece is engaging and disquieting in equal measure.

The three women of LA-based Femme Fatale (pictured top) lightened the mood, with their witty, sophisticated piece Unbounded, which highlighted their skills in popping, animation and robotic, and had more than a touch of irony in their use of musical tracks such as James Brown’s It’s a Man’s Man’s Man’s World.

The evening ended on a tremendous high with South Korea’s Jingo Crew: no concept, no soul searching, just plain, high-octane, highly skilled, acrobatic and occasionally yelp-inducing good old break dancing.Glorious.

New acts will show their mettle on Sunday.