thumb|250px|A krumper krumping in Australia

Krump is a type of dance culture that evolved through African-American street dancing popularized in the United States during the early 2000s, characterized by free, expressive, exaggerated, and highly energetic movement. The people who originated krumping saw the dance as a means for them to escape gang life.

Origins

The root word krump came from the lyrics of a 1990 song and is sometimes explained as a backronym for Kingdom Radically Uplifted Mighty Praise, which presents krumping as a faith-based art form. Krumping was created by dancers: Ceasare "Tight Eyez" Willis, Marquisa "Miss Prissy" Gardner, Christopher "Lil' C" Toler and Jo'Artis "Big Mijo" Ratti in South Central, Los Angeles, during the early 2000s. Although krumping was not directly created by Tommy, it was inspired by his “clowning”. Originally, Willis and Ratti were clown dancers for Tommy, but as their dancing was considered too "rugged" and "raw" for clowning, they left and developed krumping. LaChapelle was first introduced to krumping when he was directing Christina Aguilera's music video "Dirrty". the Auckland International Film Festival, and several other film festivals outside the United States.

Krumping’s global spread owes much to the efforts of key figures like Christopher “Lil C” Toler and Marquesa “Miss Prissy” Gardner. Lil C’s appearance as a judge on So You Think You Can Dance brought Krumping into the homes of millions worldwide, further solidifying his role as an ambassador of the style. Miss Prissy, often referred to as the “Queen of Krump,” not only contributed significantly to the documentary Rize, but also performed with major artists like Madonna, helping to popularize Krumping internationally. Both dancers continue to inspire new generations of Krumpers through their performances, teaching, and choreography. Krumping is rarely choreographed; it is almost entirely freestyle to a song (improvisational) and is danced most frequently in battles or sessions rather than on a stage. Krump is stylistically different from other hip-hop dance styles such as breaking and turfing. Krumping is very aggressive and is danced upright to upbeat and fast-paced music, but it does not promote aggression or fighting – moves are meant to take up space and challenge other dancers to feed off and return the energy, whereas breaking is more acrobatic and is danced on the floor to break beats. The Oakland dance style turfing is a fusion of popping and miming that incorporates storytelling and illusion. Krump is less precise, and more freestyle, than turfing. Thematically, all these dance styles align under the term street dance as they all share common attributes of their street origins, their freestyle nature and the use of battling.

Vocabulary

  • Battle: A direct dance competition often featuring concepts, materials, combos, and get-offs.
  • Biter: Someone who attends sessions or watches battles in order to feed on others' styles and originality, so that they can mimic those moves later at another battle and pass them off as their own inventions, i.e. plagiarism.
  • Session: When a group of krumpers form a semi-circle, or cypher in hip-hop context, and, one by one, go into the middle and freestyle.
  • Buck: An adjective used to describe someone who excels in krump, as well as high-quality adherence to the tenets of the Krump ethos.
  • Live: An adjective used to describe someone raising the energy in the session or battle.
  • Call-out: A krumper's initiation or request for battle with another krumper.
  • Lab: Deliberate experimentation by krumpers, either by themselves or with other krumpers, to create new concepts and/or advance their style.
  • Get-off: A set of movements that determines that a krumper's round is over, usually a pattern consisting solely of foundations, bang-outs, or arm-swings.
  • Kill-off: A set of movements that excites the crowd to the point where the battle is over and the crowd surrounds the krumper; the opponent is "killed off", hence the name.
  • Krumper: A dancer who specializes in krumping.
  • Krumpography: Krump used as a choreography.
  • Concept: An abstract movement that helps krumpers tell a story.
  • Material: A material movement krumpers use to show a random item to further storytelling, e.g. pouring water on the ground and slipping.
  • Jab: A short, sharp, staccato movement of the arms. The krumper extends them from the chest outwards, and with the same energy, pulls it back.
  • Stomp: Rhythmically driving the foot into and up from the ground in a way that the krumpers appear to get their energy from the ground itself.
  • Chest pop: An upward motion of the chest in the same manner as breathing into the lungs; krumpers usually do chest pops to inhale while in a session or in a round.
  • Arm swing: Moving an arm in a sweeping motion aided by gravity. There are two types of arm swings: small arm swings and big arm swings. Small arm swings are similar to the motions involved in pitching a baseball, while big arm swings are analogous to using the whole arm as a baseball bat.
  • Praise Krump: The art of krumping set to religious songs.
  • Storyline: A set of combos performed by krumpers to build up the hype and push the spazz meter to an appropriate moment for getting off or killing off their opponents.
  • Hype: The intense feeling of being swept away; for example, if a krumper does buckness (see next section), carries out a unique dance move, or kills the music, the crowd is hyped up, thus leading to a kill-off. A common krump audience perception is that the hype comes from the krumpers' moves, but krumpers also get their hype and boost their spazz meter from the crowd.
  • Spazz meter: A term used to determine the level or extent of the hype.
  • Buck talk: The act of trash talking while in a Krump battle.

Round storyline terminology

  • Atmosphere: Feeling the vibe of the environment and having the environment feel the krumpers' presence.
  • Intro: Starting one's rounds; usually with small movements, sometimes used to introduce a krumper's character or concept.
  • Rounds: A set of combos, materials, concepts, and foundations taken together.
  • Buckness: The part of the storyline where krumpers are already hyped up with their rounds, showing a series of heavy and/or fast movements; usually done with a stance of the knees slightly bent, while the arms and feet are moved far out in front of the lower extremities of the body.
  • Krump: The part of the storyline where the krumper is doing a series of foundations, concepts, and materials while standing upright, while the arms and feet are moving in front of the upper extremities of the body.
  • Liveness: The part of the storyline where the krumper is doing a series of foundations, concepts, and materials, with the body bent upward, while the arms and feet are moving outside of the body, either upwards or to the sides.
  • Get-off: The part of the storyline where the krumper is expressing feelings most intensely, letting out by rapidly showing repetitive movements such as bang-outs, jabs and redundancy.

References