Salah

Credo:Believe in your dream! Believe in yourself! Never give up!

Titles
The title I am most proud of is being the first Arab person in the whole world to win the TV Show “Incredible Talent!”

Profile

SALAH Benlemqawanssa seems to be from another world! He’s an incredible entertainer who makes an impact with each performance. With his amazing flexibility, unbelievable moves, musicality and humor, he's always a crowd pleaser, not only at Hip Hop events. He's widely respected for his popping and locking expertise kill as well as his B-Boying skills.

As light as a leaf, as hard as concrete and as flexible as wire, SALAH is not only a remarkable dancer, but also a great comedian. His performances show the years of hard training. He uses every inch of his body to make us believe that he's a not a human, but a dancing machine—a machine with feelings and a big heart. SALAH loves poetry and comedy as much as a physical challenge. The audience loves him and is always enchanted by his performances. You have to see him to believe he’s real!

Asked how he would describe his style, SALAH says, “First, I am just myself, giving my love, second, I’m a dancer, third, an entertainer.” He calls his form of dance “polyvalent dance.” He didn’t only study Hip Hop dance styles, but pretty much everything he came across. He tried to open his mind by learning African dance, salsa, rock’n roll, tap dance, contemporary dance, and even elements of belly dancing. He studied everything and combined it into something new. But he also studies people in everyday life and integrates those moves, gestures, and facial expressions into his performances.

Some people think SALAH only dances funk styles because they never had the chance to see him B-Boying, but he has that down too. "Anyone who doubts that I'm a B-Boy, meet me in the circles! I never stopped breaking!"

SALAH always tries to invent and create new moves and styles. People give him credit for starting things that are now fully adopted by the B-Boy scene. He is very flexible and so always incorporates flexible moves into his dance and some say that he revived the flexible style. A typical SALAH move is what he calls “La Tour de Pise” - Leaning Tower of Pisa, when he bends over backwards—literally—gets on his hands and freezes with his legs up in the air in a gravity defying angle. Another one of his signature moves is the spider, where he is on his hands and feet, but backwards and then he moves around like a spider. He invented that move, which is why some people call him Spider SALAH.

The first time SALAH saw popping was at the Trocadero in Paris in 1996. O Posse, a pioneering Paris Hip Hop dance crew (Baris, David, Wallid, Angel, Scorpion, Mohammed from Vagabond crew), was practicing for Jacques Martin's TV show in front of the Theatre National De Chaillot, so they could see their reflections in the windows of the theatre. They didn’t have a room to practice at the time.

SALAH recalls, “I saw them practice there and tried to imitate their movements. I didn’t know then that you’re not supposed to copy other peoples’ moves – which is considered stealing and called biting in Hip Hop, but Baris was cool, he came over and explained, ‘That’s not how you do popping. This is the way!’ and he showed me.”

“The reason I wanted to start dancing was to impress the girls,” SALAH says, smiling. “When I was young I was very shy and it was a good opportunity to communicate. I would dance and look at them, and then they would come over to talk to me. But unexpectedly, I fell in love with the dance and the dance itself became more important to me than impressing the girls.”

When we asked SALAH what performing meant to him, he straightened up and said, “The stage is my medicine. Life challenged me in many ways. What keeps me sane, what keeps me grounded, are my beliefs, my family and my dance. My family does everything for me, and I do everything for my family. When I am on stage, I take them with me. I dance for them and they dance with me. My life is dance and dance is my life. I sacrifice a lot for the dance. I am always practicing or performing. There is not much time for a personal life, but I love what I do! It takes a lot of inspiration, time and dedication to become a good dancer. Believe in yourself! Never give up and you will get what you want. If you give up once, then you’ll always give up!”

SALAH seems to be at home on stage, so it came as a surprise when he said he was still anxious each time the curtain opens. “I am still crazy nervous when I go on stage. I can feel the adrenalin pumping and the heat in my body. There are only two options – run away or kill it!”

SALAH performed a show between the battles at the RED BULL BC ONE in South Africa in 2007 and is happy to come back to the RED BULL BC ONE as a judge this year. “When I saw the DVD of the first RED BULL BC ONE, I was stunned. It was beautiful! Thanks to Red Bull for showing the world that we are not acrobats, but dancers with high level energy performances. Red Bull gives B-Boys a platform to show what breaking is about—that B-Boying is an art form. I hope that in the future they will organize an event like this for Popping and also for Locking. Red Bull can help to foster the new generation of dancers."

When asked how he judges a battle, SALAH had a lot to say, “I want to see you feel the music and dance with your heart. I want to see you correspond to the music and the floor. The floor is your friend, not your enemy. Some B-Boys throw themselves on the floor in a painful manner, just to get cheers from the audience, but that's bad for your body and if you are a dancer you should treat your body with respect.

I want to see spontaneity. When I see you dance, I can tell if you are just doing routines. It’s easy to tell if somebody is vibing and dancing or counting and thinking. Play with the rhythm! It’s easy to follow the beat and accentuate it in a typical manner, but I like to see somebody break the beat, play with it and throw stuff in a more difficult pattern than just do what the beat dictates.

I want to see well rounded B-Boys. Yes, I do want to see power moves, but also all the other elements of B-Boying. And I want to see how you put your personal spin on them. I want to see development. It’s 2009, not 1982, so I want to see how you translate the six-step into your very own footwork of 2009.

When you are on the stage for a battle—never forget: it’s not an open circle! It’s a battle! That means you have to beat your challenger with respect and with your technique. Bring what you practiced hard to the stage and show you’re better than him! You don’t need insulting gestures. The moment you waste on insulting your opponent is a moment you lose being yourself—one with the music. Don’t try something you don’t control 100 percent! Good luck to all the 16 amazing B-Boys of the RED BULL BC ONE 2009 in New York! Believe in your dream! Believe in yourself! Never give up!” - SALAH