Duo performance by iDummy & Ladia Yates. Filmed by Yak Films at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco. Music by Daniel Bernard Roumain

http://www.ybca.org/classick-hip-hop

“Just because we work in a building with high ceilings and glass walls don’t mean we don’t watch YouTube…”
— Marc Bamuthi Joseph, Director of Performance

What happens when you pair an up-and-coming composer/virtuoso violinist with five hip-hop dance acts on the same stage? We call it Clas/sick Hip Hop—a two-night mini-festival featuring legendary hip hop pioneer Rennie Harris, trail-blazing b-girl Ana “Rokafella” Garcia, Montreal’s b-boy Arthur “Lil Crabe” Cadre, Bay Area new comers Ladia Yates and I Dummy, and composer/virtuoso violinist Daniel Bernard Roumain in a mashup of music and movement you won’t want to miss.

Internationally renowned award-winning choreographer Rennie Harris is hailed as one of the godfathers of hip hop in America. With his company, Rennie Harris PureMovement (founded in 1992), he brought hip-hop dance to the concert stage as an alternative to the stereotypes and negative images of it created by television and to recognize its myriad influences, inventive spirit, and potential to bring people together.

Better known as Rokafella, Ana Garcia burst through the concrete ceiling of the male-dominated hip hop scene. Through her music, dance, and recent film All the Ladies Say, highlighting the lives of six iconic female street dancers, she has become a mentor to the many young b-girls now emerging worldwide.

Richmond-born Ladia Yates and 19-year-old Oakland native Levi “I Dummy” Allen provide a look at the diversity of dance styles overtaking the Bay Area. One of the rising stars of the Bay Area hip hop scene, Ladia has been described as “the Queen of Jookin;” I Dummy wowed the So You Think You Can Dance judges during his audition for Season 8 with his turf (“taking up room on the floor”) dancing.

Daniel Bernard Roumain melds his classical music roots with his own cultural references and vibrant musical imagination. He has carved a reputation for himself as an innovative composer, performer, violinist, and band leader and is perhaps the only composer who has collaborated and performed with Philip Glass, Cassandra Wilson, Bill T. Jones, and Lady Gaga.