Friday, October 9, 2020

The History Of Break Dancing: With Focus On The Pre-Hip Hop dance called "Burning" (also known as "Rock" And "Uprock")


MichaelWaynetv, Oct 17, 2013

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Edited by Azizi Powell

This pancocojams post provides my unofficial transcription of this embedded video.

This post also includes three additional comments from that MichaelWaynetv YouTube account about the pre-break dance and pre Hip Hop dance called "burning".

In addition, this pancocojams post includes an excerpt of a Wikipedia article about "uprock" which is also known as Rock, Rock Dance, Brooklyn Rock, Burning or Freestyle

The Addendum to this post provides a definition of the African American Vernacular English word "to burn". That use of "burn" is the source of the word "burning" that is used in this  video.

The content of this post is presented for historical and cultural purposes.

All copyrights remain with their owners.

Thaks to Michael Waynetv and all those who are quoted in this post.
-snip-  
Paraphrasing the stated purpose of the MichaelWaynetv YouTube account, that account provide interviews with members or former members of the Bronx (New York City) Spade gang in the 1970s as a means of correcting the published history of Hip Hop. These interviews attest to the major role the Bronx, New York Spade gang had in the formation of  Hip Hop. In particular, these interviews vigorously debunk the history of Hip Hop as promulgated by KRS One and pay homage to Mario the Disco King, one of the leaders of the Spade gang, and other pioneers of Hip Hop who have not been given the credit that they deserve for that now international music and dance genre. 

WARNING: This YouTube video, and other videos in MichaelWaynetv's YouTube account contain profanity and also include a form of the referent that is now largely known as the n word. 

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PANCOCOJAMS EDITOR'S NOTE
This is my unofficial transcription of this video. I chose to transcribe this video because there's only a little bit of information online about the history of Hip Hop, the Spades dance, burning [dance], and some other topics that are discussed in this interview. 

Disclaimer: I'm not and have never been a member of the Spades or any other gang and I've not had any contact with Michael Wayne or anyone else in these videos. Their comments and additions and corrections to this transcription are very welcome.    

My notes/explanations in this transcription are given in brackets. The first comments about "burning" are given in bold font to highlight those comments.

This video is given as Part 2 of 2, however I haven't found Part 1 of 2.   
-snip-
Click https://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2020/10/youtube-video-with-comments-about-rock.html for the closely related pancocojams post entitled "
YouTube Video With Comments About Rock Dance (Burning/UpRock) in Brooklyn "

****
TRANSCRIPTION OF https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGiWxc7GUss&ab_channel=MichaelWaynetv
"PART 2 OF 2 ...Zulu King Cholly Rock talks about the very beginning of breakdancing with The Black Spades, The N [four letter form of the n word] Twins, Clark Kent, James Bond and the Zulu Kings

 Michael Waynetv [MWTV] -Let’s define what Hip Hop culture is. How would you define it? What’s your definition of-

Cholly Rock [CR]- Ah, what it is now  - Annnd it has [gotten] real commercial-I have a definition for now. Right, you know you have people who created the five different elements and all these different things and that’s what it’s become. But what it was for me always was the music, and the dancers. And, eventually, later on the rappers. And that’s what it always has been for me. And that’s what I still continue to define it as. And I understand that others have added the media artist and all that kind of thing. That’s great if you wanna add that. But, for me, the graffiti artists were in existence even before Hip Hop culture. I know a lot of cats that were graffiti artists. I know White guys who were graffiti artists who wouldn’t have anything to do with Black people let alone with Hip Hop.


MWTV- Um

CR – So, you know, I I appreciate that it was incorporated in. That’s wonderful. But I’ve always defined Hip Hop or what it’s come to be known as Hip Hop as the music, the style of dance, and the style of mc-ing or rapping. I think that’s what it’s all inclusive.

MWTV- Okay, so where would you- on the Hip Hop time line- where, how would you start it off? The history of Hip Hop, where would it start from?

CR-  Well, you can’t have the history of Hip Hop without first of all talkin about the gang culture and the Black Spades. Um, one of the things that I told you when we were talkin on the phone was and we were talkin about the light bulb and now we had the light bulb

MWTV- Right

CR- Thomas Edison created the light bulb, and all that the light bulb

MWTV- Right
CR- But he couldn’t have done that without Ben Franklin discovering electricity one hundred years or whatever previously.

MWTV- Right

 CR- So, while the genius of Hip Hop and and I know people aren’t  gonna like this,  is Kool Herc, and people  can say whatever they want , he would not be possible without the electricity that was created by the culture that was existed in the 1970s, the early part of the 70s, and that specifically was the gang culture, and more specifically startin with the Black Spades.   

MWTV- Oh okay- the Spades. Now, I just had-you know what I’m saying- a Spade tellin me that they was doin a Spade dance.

CR - Oh yeah.
MWTV -He felt like that’s where break dancing kinda came from.

CR- (shakes his head up and down and says) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um…

[video moves to a later clip in this same interview] 

CR- And so Spade dance is one of the areas where it started. Then you had people doin what used to be known as “burning”. Okay.

MWTV- “Burning”

CR-“Burning”, yeah, which is the precursor of “break dancing”.


MWTV- Okay.

CR- And you gotta remember, all art forms take from various other art forms

MWTV- Right

CR- And you know, and so, burning was like a thing that was maybe a precursor to “uprock”. And so, somebody’s dancing and you know you doin your thing, and you might turn and embarrass somebody you take your square [mimicking moving his hands back and forth] and you screw their head off and pretend you kickin it down the hall and

MWTV- Right, right, right

CR- And then you put your hand in somebody’s face and drop back, you know, and that’s “burning”. And that was breaking in its own way.  And then as it evolved, you had the locking dances way out in California

MWTV- Right

CR- and they were doin the pop lockin and down lockin  and

MWTV- but that wasn’t in the Bronx so right?

CR-Oh, no, that wasn’t here yet

CR – But if you look at early episodes of Soul Train

MWTV- Right

CR- Right, so Soul Train started in Chicago, but when they moved to LA,

MWTV- Un Hun

CR- and added people like Rerun [a dancer who later became an actor in the Black television series Good Times],

MWTV-Right
CR- they were out in California.
MWTV- Right
CR- It was a West Coast kinda thing. And they were doing the popping and everything. So even the elements of break dancing were incorporated some of that. But break dancing as you know it today, right, when cats are goin on to the floor, that’s when you had the original b-boys such as the twins, the “Ni&&a twins”*-Kevin and Kenny and “Clark Kent”-I can’t remember “Clark Kent’s real name. But Clark Kent was Clark Kent, ‘cause he looked like Clark Kent. He used to wear horn rimmed glasses
MWTV- Oh yeah?

CR- Yeah, he used to wear horn rimmed glasses. He was a bad boy on the dance floor. Uh, “James Bond” . “James Bond” used to do things. He be spinning, then he’d run around and kick off his shoe like he was down there gonna fall like Get Smart . Things like that. Cute little things...

So you would be doin…so all these different elements created break dancing. But, you know, you saw the cats spin on the floor-that’s the Twins, you saw Clark Kent, myself,

MWTV- Right

CR- the Zulu Kings, there were the Zulu Kings,

MWTV- Right

CR- [naming other original b-boys] Scorpion Mad, A Beat, Sonbeau, you know, Fukisa

MWTV- So you’re sayin, you’re sayin Clark Kent, they came before the Zulu Kings.

CR- We’re all around the same time.

MWTV – All around the same time  

CR- Alright, but I was… the first people I really saw really gettin down like that on the floor were the Twins…

MWTV- And what was they doin exactly?


CR- Well, I can’t do it for you ‘cause I’m too old. [laughs]

MWTV- Right
CR- But they woulda’ve- cats be like, up rock, and getting it [demonstrates the back and forth movement with feet crossed in front of each other that b-boys and b-girls still do]. Like that.

MWTV- Right.

CR- Then, you know, they’d drop down and start spinnin. And I can’t do all that for you. I wish I could. I’mma little old.

MTWV- Right. 
 
CR- They were spinning around and might do a freeze, and poses and all those different kinds of things. But, they’re the ones who first started droppin to the floor. Before that, pretty much, breaking, or burning-like I told you-was more. It was upright. It was nobody on the floor.
MTWV- Is there a relationship between “burning” and “spade dance”?

CR- I would say “Yeah”. Yeah.

MTWV- Yeah?

CR- I would say “Yeah”.

MTWV- The Spade dance is first, though, right? ‘Cause they were doin that in the 60s…

CR- Yeah, yeah. 

MTWV- the beginning of the spade dance.

CR- The late 60s, the beginning of the 70s- Yeah. I would definitely say that that’s correct. You know,

MTWV- Um.
CR-  You know what I mean is that people don’t understand- One won’t exist without the other.

MTWV- Um

CR- You know what I mean?  Something had to come first and and ,you know,  when a baby’s born, the baby he don’t look nothing like what he looks like when he’s grown.

MTWV- Right
CR- But that don’t change the fact that that’s what he was when he was a baby.

MTWV- Right.

CR- You know what I mean?

MTWV- Right.
CR- So, all those elements went into break dancing. And those are the foundation of Hip Hop and the music. 

MTWV- Um.
CR. And

 MTWV- Hun.

CR.- And that’s Kool Herc. You know

MTWV- Hun.

CR- And that’s Kool Herc.

MTWV- Okay. Right [laughs] Okay. 

CR- That’s right. That’s it.

[a short time later]

MTWV- Me and you. We basically agree. I think we just use maybe different words. You say, um, that Benjamin Franklin and the light bulb, and

CR- electricity, yeah

MTWV- You sayin, you sayin

CR- Herc and Hip Hop would not be possible without the culture that existed in gang culture, specifically The Black Spades.

MTWV-Right.

 CR- So they laid that ground-that energy.

[a short time later in the same interview]

MTWV-   You know the b-boys. You went to the west side and you saying the first dudes was just up-rockin and that was first.

CR - Yeah, originally “burning.”

MTWV- “Burning”

CR- Yeah. Burning started gettin cats on the floor. Like the Twins would do everything. They were spinning and doin all that

MTWV- Right.

CR – And, you know, we liked that. And be doin it too. You know.

MTWV- Do you know, who, who… You said the first people to get on the floor…

CR-There may have been some earlier, but that’s me that thinks that The Twins were the [first] ones to do the spinning.

MTWV- Yeah.
What’s the names? What’s their names?

CR- The Twins. They used to call the the ni--a twins”. I don’ t like that name, but’s what they called them. That was their name. Kevin and Kenny and their little brothers. And they’d hang out with us, The Zulus, and everything and Clark Kent. They were from the Nob [?]. That’s where they were originally from.

MTWV- Webster.     

CR- [identifying which neighborhood in the Bronx these dancers were from] Webster. Yeah.
Nob [?] 69, Webster ah,

 MTWV- ah Washington

 CR- Washington Ave. Right right.
That’s where they were at. That’s right…Butler, the houses, that’s right.
But that’s the area that they were from.

[later in the same interview

CR- So when you talking about this to other people, some of the people who are talking, weren’t there.

MTWV- Right.

CR- They weren’t there. They were in the f--king 80s. We had already stopped [doing breaking] by that time. 

MTWV- So …okay. So you would say, you would say the culture started with the Black Spades.

CR- Yeah. A spark of the culture started with the Black Spades.

MTWV- a spark of the culture

CR- Yeah. It’s carved out of gang culture…

Yeah Yeah.

And I don’t think that anybody can argue that.

MTWV- Right.

CR- You know. They cannot. Even the Latino gangs. And now, the Latino gangs. Here’s where I’m with them. I know everybody says Rock Steady and everything.

 MTWV- Right.

CR- We had stopped b-boying.

MTWV- Right.

 CR- They continued.

MTWV- You say like [19] 81 maybe 81, 82.

 CR- 80, 80, 79, 80.

MTWV- What was you’ll dancing?
Did you give up on dancing all together?

CR- No, no. We always danced. We freak danced.

 MTWV- The freak?

 CR- Yeah, the freak was a crazy damn dance. We’d do the freak dancing in the 70s.

MTWV-Okay.

 CR-  The freak dance. It was always like stimulated sex on the dance floor. Yeah. Yeah, the freak dance was crazy.

It was crazy. It was like you get a girl and basically you start humpin and grindin her to the music. And that is what the freak dance was.

 MTWV- And after you’ll stopped…

CR- Yeah, the freak dance kinda interlapped all of that. We were in to chicks. I mean, you know, you got a choice between spinning on the ground and getting your sh-t* on with a chick, which one you gonna do.

MTWV- Un. Hun.

CR. – So you know, the freak dance, and then there was a dance like the “Patty Duke”.

MTWV- The Patty Duke


CR- The Patty Duke was a joint like this [CR stands in place, leaning slightly while performing shoulder isolations-shrugging your shoulders from the front to the back, or from the left to the right while also shaking your butt]. You were shrugging your shoulders.

MTWV- In the 80s the Patty Duke?!

 CR- In the 70s.

 MTWV- Right. Okay.

 CR- You know what I mean. So we were doin more dances that people in regular clubs. We weren’t b-boying.

MTWV- When Sugar Hill Gang came out****, you, were you still break dancing at that time?

 CR- No.

 MTWV- No?

CR. Naw. We had pretty much stopped by then. But the Latino kids was.

MTWV- They were the Rock Steady Crew.

 CR- They came like 80.     

MTWV- 80

 CR- 80, 81 you know.
But the Latino cats they kept it up. That’s when they were doing the up-rocking and going down. You seen them old pictures of them. I can’t even do that sh-t* today. They were doing some sh-t*, and bending down and doing it all. They were doing it. But they kept that spark of b-boying and break dancing alive when we had kinda just outgrown it. And, like I said, who knows. We didn’t know it was gonna be a worldwide phenomenon.

MTWV- Un hun.
CR- We would have been the ones in the videos doin all that stuff. But, you know, sometimes its just about being in the right place at the right time. It ain’t got nothing to do with anything else. And for Rock Steady, they didn’t have anything to do with it. They were just in the right place at the right time and they just picked up where we left off. And it’s as simple at that. They ain’t knockin them. It ain’t anything. That’s just a fact. That’s just what it is. And it’s cool, but you can’t speak about sh-t* that you don’t know about.

MTWV- Right. Right.
CR – Unless somebody told you.     
MTWV- Right.

CR- We talkin about cats who were here. When I talk about it, I don’t have anything to gain out of it. Man, I have a Masters degree. I teach. That’s my world. I ain’t tryin to get a record deal. I don’t give a sh-t about none of that. What I know is what the history is and give people their due.

MTWV- Right.

CR- Give people their due. And tell the history honestly.

MTWV-Okay

[later on in the same interview
]

MTWV- Let’s come to the conclusion.

CR- Yeah.

MTWV- Let’s wrap it all up. So we say Hip Hop with the gang culture.

CR- Yeah.

MTWV - Hip Hop culture started with the gang culture

CR- Absolutely

MTWV- The Spades with the Spade dance.

CR- Yeah

MTWV- which was later burning.

CR- burning.

MTWV -which was specifically breaking and burning and breaking each borrowed from one another.

CR- Yeah and eventually became what is called b-boying.

MTWV- So Spade dancing, what it like turning with it?

CR- Turning and stomping. A lot of stomping and a lot of turning. What now was probably up-rocking.
  
A lot of spinning.

MTWV- Show us a little.

CR- I can’t do all of it.

[That segment ends before the demonstration and continues a little later in the same interview.]

CR- Stomping. Something like that. It gets more elaborate, but I can’t do all of that because I’m in too much pain to do all that.

MTWV- Right.

CR- It gets more elaborate than that.

MTWV- Right

CR. The main part about about the Spade is the stomping. You make a loud noise and it goes “Boom Boom” and you know, it’s intimidating and that’s part of the process. And you know as I said, you start with one thing and then you add something else and it might not be recognizable by the time you finish it, but the point is- it started with that."
-snip-
This 
video ends with this note:
"
A Hip Hop History That Does Not Include The Black Spades, Young Spade and Baby Spades Is Built On Falsehood…

Let’s set the Hip Hop Record Straight."

****
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS FROM OTHER MICHAELWAYNETV VIDEOS ABOUT "BURNING"

The sentences that include references to "burning" are given in italics. Numbers are added for referencing purposes only.

WARNING: These YouTube videos, and other videos in MichaelWaynetv's YouTube account contain profanity and also include a four letter form of the referent that is now largely known as the n word. 

From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5oc5bqXwLA&ab_channel=MichaelWaynetv
1. Michael Waynetv, 2016

..."bronx teenagers was already doing creative dance during the breakdown parts of songs…they called it "burnin"..they was trying to outdo each other , burn each other …herc saw that…so when he became a deejay, herc was the one to exclusively focus on playing the breakdown parts…he would loop break down after breakdown for hours….so the teenagers who liked that, gravitated to herc parties…they became known as break boys/b-boys

**
2. ponnell johnson, 2017
… "Also, why does everyone keep referring to rap as "hip hop", and burning as "break dancing"? We didn't "hip hop" to each other, we rapped. We didn't "breakdance" (which is gay)*, we burned. White culture has definitely distorted our art and lifestyle. They even perverted graffiti promoting no talent so called artists like Kieth Herring. Every hear the phrase "my bad"? Well the REAL phrase is "my BAG" which gets it's origin from a James Brown song (I got a bag of my own, Papa's got a brand new bag). our culture is continuously being hijacked but we are the enablers. Society takes from us, locks us up, then re bottles and markets our souls. By the way, when was the last time you heard the phrase "soul power" or "soul brother" or even "soul food?"..
-snip-
In this comment “gay” may be homophobic or the word “gay” may also be used as a negative as discussed in this excerpt from https://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/dec/21/the-gay-word-what-does-it-mean-when-young-people-use-it-negatively

“The 'gay' word: what does it mean when young people use it negatively?”
Amy Ashenden,  21 Dec 2015
[Gay] is “A word that originally meant happy and carefree became a neutral label to describe homosexuality, and ended up being a term used to pinpoint something people don’t like, find embarrassing, or want to distance themselves from.”
-end of quote-
That article talked about the harmful consequences of this usage for gay people and for non-gay people.

**
From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qR38Uwkpko8&ab_channel=MichaelWaynetv

Michael Waynetv, 2017
"
Dark Angel ..... right agree with most of your comment ...however... you said "the whole culture of hip hop didnt exist at that point in all it's elements." gotta strongly disagree with that ..yes all the elements was there with the spades..black spades are the original graffiti taggers in nyc...spraypainting spades on buildings, floors to mark their territory...so they had graffiti, street knowledge...street emceeing street deejayin and street dance before herc even became a deejay... at that time teenagers would wait for the breakdown parts of songs then "go off" creating dance routines to "burn" each other..herc saw what the teenagers in the bronx liked at parties and jams ...so herc became a deejay and started to focus on looping the breakdown parts of songs over and over...herc extended the breakdown giving teens a longer time to "burn" each other...bambaataa came and defined this new way of life ...bambaataa gave it definition

****
EXCERPT FROM WIKIPEDIA ARTICLE ABOUT UPROCK
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uprock
"
Uprock, or Rocking, as it was originally referred to, also known as Rock, Rock Dance, Brooklyn Rock, Burning or Freestyle is a competitive urban street dance, performed to the beats and rhythms of soul, rock and funk music, but was mostly danced to a specific and exclusive collection of songs that contained a hard driving beat. An example of such a song is the Rock classic "It's Just Begun" by noted jazz musician Jimmy Castor. The dance consists of foot shuffles, spins, turns, drops, freestyle movements and more characteristically a four-point sudden body movement called "jerk"

"Use of gestures

Although women participated in this style of dance, it was usually danced by two men facing each other. The underlying philosophy of Rocking was to undermine the "opponent" with hand gestures called "burns". One would "burn" one's opponent with a variety of these hand gestures that would mimic an action that would be considered detrimental to the dancer's adversary. Two examples of typical and fundamental burns are the bow and arrow, and the shotgun. The "winner" of these mock battles was usually the individual who was able to choreograph and execute his or her burns creatively and even artistically to the rhythm and syncopation of the music.

In this sophisticated and rhythmic form of Rock paper scissors, one would have to dance thoughtfully as to not step forward and inadvertently get one's head "sledge hammered". Although it is common knowledge that Uprocking is supposed to be a mock battle, those who are less professional sometimes get carried away with the dance which can result in real violence.

History

Rock dance evolved in New York City circa in the late 1960s.

As Rocking/Uprocking developed, body movements called "jerks" and hand gestures called "burns" (as defined above in this article), would be added to emulate a fight against an opposing dancer. Being skillful in this new dance form, Apache (a Brooklyn dancer) would get the better of his opponents by skillfully using burns. Dancers throughout New York City in all Boroughs continued to invent new movements and gestures to create a street dance. Many gang members began to perform this dance. Rocking/Uprocking became a competitive dance that caught on very quickly."...

****
ADDENDUM- THE AFRICAN AMERICAN VERNACULAR ENGLISH MEANING OF "TO BURN [SOMEONE]" OR "TO GIVE A BURN"
From http://onlineslangdictionary.com/meaning-definition-of/burn
"burn
interjection
exclamation upon hearing a particularly witty or impressive insult.

BURN!

[,,]

-Last edited on Mar 08 2010. Submitted by Dom from Lakebay, WA, USA on Mar 10 2002
.

****
From https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=burn
1. burn
"(1) slang: to disrespect someone (to diss); to make fun of someone; used by a third party after a first party makes fun of a second party. Brought back to life by the ever-popular That 70's Show"...

by THE ALL KNOWING AMY May 05, 2004


**
2. 
burn
"
A usually sarcastic and insulting comment, devised to burn someone's emotions. Brilliant burns are something anyone around, other than the wimpy victim, should appreciate. If you give one of these ingenius burns, someone around surely will utter, "Oh BURN!!". One must never say these words if they are administering the burn. This sucks most of the burning potential out of it, and, since no one else says "Oh BURN!!", it makes the victim think that only the burner agrees with the comment, giving little to no burned emotion, which makes a burn with the burner saying "burn" not a true burn. Also, when burning, it is best not to actually start the burn, that is, a burn is more painful if the victim says something normal and the burner makes a burning comment, or addition to what the victim said, thus burning the victim. So never say the beginning to what makes a burn; you'll just sound stupid. So good luck, be quick, don't say "burn" if you're burning someone, and don't say the starting words to a burn. Now go out and burn somebody!

WRONG!:

Stupid Guy: "Huh! Hey-hey! Yer momma's fat an' UGLY! OH YEAH!! BURN!!!!!"

 RIGHT!:

Victim: "Wow. Your house is really small."

Intelligent Person: "Yeah, there's just enough room in there for me and yo' momma!"

Guy: "OH BURN!!" "

by Mbleh November 04, 2007

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