Midterm Reflection on Hip-hop Music and Dance Essay

A Reflection on Hip-hop Music and Dance
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Midterm Reflection on Hip-hop Music and Dance
As a student in the field of visual and performing arts, I have learned to appreciate the precious moment of learning techniques in hip-hop music. I remember being fascinated by hip-hop and rap at an early age. Although hip-hop is faced by many controversial issues such as whether listening to hip-hop music makes people believe money is the only way to earn respect and power, there is still some part of the music that brings enjoyment. I have learned some interesting facts about hip-hop this that I will discuss in this paper.
I have realized that hip-hop social dances started to develop in the 1980s when certain moves started to gains popularity such as breaking, popping and locking. Locking, for instance, is a technique that brings a lot of enjoyment when an individual has the ability to link various dance moves and create a continuous flow. Locking requires a lot of rehearsals for one to gain perfection. I have noted that in locking there are some movements’ vocabularies that dancers need to master each of them differently before they start linking them together. When locking, the knees must always be bent slightly to allow for constant bouncing and also for switching from one move to another.
I have always been very determined in learning new things which have helped significantly throughout my course work especially in doing a critical analysis of skills. The dances that existed in the 1980s were mostly party dancing that dancers would showcase their styles (Jackson, 2001). In 2000 hip-hop dances become competitive and their commercialization was now widespread. I have also noted a trend in the hip-hop industry that new hip-hop dances are invented as new hip-hop music is released.
I have realized how f...