Professional hip hop dance instructor Anthony "Redd" Williams (front), visiting form St. Louis, has been spending his evenings in Tacoma helping DASH Center's Reality Check Dance Team prepare for their KRUNK VII showcase happening Feb. 4 at Mt. Tahoma High School. (Photo by Jaidyn Mack)

Representing the best of Washington State's finest hip hop dance teams, Tacoma's own Reality Check Dance Troupe will host and perform live at KRUNK VII: Born From A Boombox, Feb. 3 at Mt. Tahoma High School. A showcase of our area's most dedicated and accomplished young hip hop dancers, KRUNK VII is presented by DASH Center for the Performing Arts, where the talent for this annual event has worked hard to get the privilege of performing in it.

DASH Center is a 501(c) 3 nonprofit organization dedicated to providing quality performing arts education to inner city and at-risk youth. Students there are required to meet high standards to participate in DASH programs, including showing up for all classes and rehearsals, staying out of trouble and keeping their grades up at school. In fact, many DASH students excel in school knowing their reward is to take part in this most exciting and unique center for arts education. Performing in KRUNK is big for these talented youngsters, as they've truly earned their way there.

A special guest choreographer is also in town for KRUNK VII – Anthony "Redd" Williams. On the faculty of the renowned Center of Creative Arts (COCA) in his hometown of St. Louis, Williams is taking a one-week break from his teaching duties there to share his considerable knowledge and electric moves with the youth at DASH Center.

Just for KRUNK VII, Williams teamed up with DASH Executive Director Candi Hall and Dance Director Charles Simmons to choreograph what promises to be a dynamite number featuring all dance teams from DASH.

Each year, Reality Check invites more than 10 dance teams from all over Washington to come show what they've got. This year, prepare to be blown away by teams such as Kontagious, Diamonds in the Rough, Koncrete, Full Force, Misfits, Xxtra!!, RCX, Stadium and Bellarmine high schools and many more. All proceeds from KRUNK benefit the Reality Check youth outreach program.  

For the first time this year, KRUNK is being entirely produced and staged by the youth themselves. "They did everything that has to do with this show. It is solely in the hands of the youth," Hall said, pointing out that this is another layer of the students' education in how to work in the entertainment industry.

KRUNK VII: Born from a Boombox happens Feb. 4, 7:30 p.m. at Mt. Tahoma High School (4634 S. 74th St.). Tickets – $10 for upper-level seating and $15 for house seats – are available now at DASH Center (1504 Martin Luther King Jr. Way).

A FORCE IN HIP HOP DANCE

Upon visiting DASH Center for the first time this week, Williams said he is amazed at the quality of education going on there – lessons that impact the students' personal lives as well in an effort to help them grow to be good people with bright futures. He remarked over how Hall's vision became something the whole community is benefiting from – especially the children.

"It's amazing – it really is. I didn't know it was that in-depth," he said, referring to the fact that DASH students learn dancing, acting, singing, how to play musical instruments, how to professionally make and record music, how to produce shows and events and much more.

Williams said that he himself is a product of a similar community-based arts organization for inner-city youth. "I come from that same background and that's how I started choreographing, but it was never anything of this (DASH Center's) magnitude." Not having the opportunity to take formal dance lessons, Williams would record TV awards shows and music videos on VHS tape and learn the dance moves by heart. It wasn't until he moved to Los Angeles in 2003 at 20 years old that he took his first formal dance class. He moved back to St. Louis in 2007 to take the faculty position at COCA.

Williams observed that while the youth may have a tough attitude on the streets, once they get inside a place like DASH Center it melts away. He saw this effect first-hand when he visited the center this week. "You get a lot of kids that kind of act ashamed of doing stuff like dancing and singing, but they were singing 'do re mi' and all kinds of stuff like they love to be there and they want to be there – they're not ashamed of it because they love what they're doing."

Having grown up in the St. Louis projects, Williams knows intimately what at-risk youth must overcome in the inner-city life. Dance was his escape – his joy that continues to this day – and he's eager to share that with young people in Tacoma. Hall, DASH Center Dance Director Charles Simmons and Assistant Director Jimmy Shields knew he'd bring much to the aspiring performers here in T-Town.

"He is a really great teacher with a lot of energy," Hall said. She also likes his individual style of hip hop dance in which he teaches students moves other than what's trendy right now.

"While it's good to be able to dance all those styles, he doesn't let that influence his own style of dance," she said. "You see choreographers doing the same thing the same way, but Redd has a different way that's his own. This is important to me because this is something I preach to the kids all the time – continue to be you. Develop your style and who you are. I want them to be well-rounded dancers."

Williams has done a lot so far in his young life, including establishing the solid hip hop dance program among the heavily traditional dance curriculum at COCA. "There has never been a strong hip hop program there that could compete with the jazz and ballet programs. I've been working really hard, and now the hip hop program is one of the largest programs at COCA. I have turned their whole perspective on hip hop dance completely around." He also teaches night classes twice a week for $1 at Pinx Academy of Dance in St. Louis, where he has discovered many of the dancers he's enlisted for his own dance company. 
"Not everyone can afford COCA. I teach this class because I know that," he said.

Williams' resume is quite impressive. He has performed on tours, in music videos and in television commercials for some of the industry's biggest recording artists such as Marques Houston, Beyoncé, Corbin Bleu, Lady Gaga, Angela Winbush and for Adidas Industrial. His choreography has been performed by legends like Nelly and featured at top venues like Showtime at the Apollo and the Missouri Black Expo. He has worked with accomplished choreographers like Laureianne Gibson, Cecily & Olisa, Ro Ro, Kennis, and Rosero & Jamal, and has assisted with choreography for artist Kishaya in the Starbucks Dancing Commercial and D Girl Music Video.  
Williams has been featured regularly at Grand Center's Dancing in the Streets festival and at Better Family Life's Black Dance St. Louis. In 2004, he won the U Got Served Dance Off for choreography. Williams has also taught hip-hop at the Millennium Dance Complex and the Debbie Reynolds Dance Studio, both in Los Angeles.