Afro Dance Xplosion 2024 – Beyond Borders [Workshop Series]

11:00am – 12:30pm | Afro Fusion with Antonio Bukhar Ssebuum (£20)

Antonio's Afro-fusion class features popular Afrobeats tracks and connects modern movements like the Tshwala to their traditional roots. This high-energy class is designed to foster positivity and pure enjoyment while enhancing physical capacity and endurance. Participants will learn new moves and practice popular ones to music from artists such as Burna Boy, P-Square, Olamide, Davido, and Wizkid. Antonio will also teach choreography that participants will present in groups, with repetition to deepen their understanding of individuality and freedom of expression. Be ready to sweat and stay hydrated. This class is open to all levels of dance experience and background.

12:30pm – 12:45pm
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12:45pm – 14:15pm | Congolese traditional dance with Chantal Loïal (£20)

This course will take you on a journey to the Congo. Chantal Loïal having danced for many years with Congolese artists such as Kanda Bongo Man with whom she travelled the world in order to transmit to spectators around the world the hip movements and sternum work characteristic of Congolese dances, this time, it's you she will make vibrate to the pioneering air rhythms of traditional Congolese ballets and Congolese music from the 80s like Mario from Franco Ok Jazz.

14:15pm – 14:30pm
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14:30pm – 16:30pm | Traditional West African Dance with Diamano Coura (£30)

This will be a two hour workshop teaching one or two rhythms from West Africa. These classes will be accompanied by live musicians from Diamano Coura and taught by a member of the Diamano Coura company. The rhythms being taught will be announced closer to the time.

11:00am – 12:30pm | Hip-Hop with Antonio Bukhar Ssebuum (£20)

In this workshop, Antonio combines his expertise in hip-hop, breaking, and house to create a dynamic, mixed-level street dance class. Participants will be introduced to a holistic approach to various street dance styles, learning new movements and concepts. The class will involve both the acquisition of new material and engaging tasks that encourage the exploration of how different street styles affect the body. This includes delving into the technical aspects of weight, body structure, coordination, and musicality. By the end of the workshop, participants will not only have learned new movements but also how to collage them into a cohesive choreography.

12:30pm – 12:45pm
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12:45pm – 14:15pm | Gwoka from Guadeloupe with Chantal Loïal (£20)

Come and discover all the richness and energy of Afro-Caribbean dance! Do you want to learn to move to warm and vibrant rhythms? Are you looking to immerse yourself in Caribbean culture while working your body and having fun? So, don't miss this unique opportunity to participate in an Afro-Caribbean dance classe given by Chantal Loïal, artistic director and choreographer of the Difé Kako company.

The lesson will focus on gwoka and the seven rhythms of Guadeloupe, Chantal Loïal will introduce you to some of these seven rhythms (toumblack, graj, woulé, etc.) accompanied by her musicians live.

14:15pm – 14:30pm
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14:30pm – 16:30pm | Traditional West African Dance with Diamano Coura - (£30)

This will be a two hour workshop teaching one or two rhythms from West Africa. These classes will be accompanied by live musicians from Diamano Coura and taught by a member of the Diamano Coura company. The rhythms being taught will be announced closer to the time.

Antonio Bukhar Ssebuuma is an interdisciplinary artist from Uganda, who specializes in dance and has been lecturing at the Northern School of Contemporary Dance in Leeds, UK since 2021. His versatile style includes Afro-fusion, Hip-hop, Dancehall, Breaking, and Ugandan indigenous dances.

Antonio has engaged with diverse cultural, artistic, and social contexts as a teacher, choreographer, educator, performer, and community arts practitioner. In disadvantaged settings such as slums, orphanages, and refugee centres, as well as renowned theatres, festivals, and schools across Africa, Europe, and Australasia.

In 2017, Antonio was awarded the Pina Bausch Fellowship, serving as a visiting dance scholar at the University of Auckland. He also received the Caroline Plummer Community Dance Fellowship at the University of Otago in 2019, both in New Zealand. He has worked with other dance institutions such as Makerere University in Uganda, Codarts Dance Centre in the Netherlands, Pacific Institute of Performing Arts, and the Norwegian College of Dance.

Scroll down to our video library to watch a excerpt of one of their classes.

Chantal Loïal (choreographer) Dancer in the Montalvo-Hervieu company (France), the Ballets C. de la B. (Les BalletsContemporains de Belgique) and for the choreographer Raphaëlle Delaunay in the piece Bitter Sugar. She also directs her own company Difé Kako which she created in 1994.

Born in Pointe-à-Pitre, Guadeloupe, she was just six years old when she took her first traditional dance steps in a Guadeloupean group. A passion that she was able to realise with her arrival in mainland France in 1977. She rubbed shoulders with African, then West Indian and contemporary dance circles. Over the years, she acquired complete mastery of her art and joined the ranks of professional dancers and choreographers.

At all times, and still today, she nourishes her experience of encounters: Assaï Samba choreographer, Lolita Babindamana, choreographer of the National Ballet of Congo, the Lemba Ballet theater, Tchico Tchikaya, Congolese singer, Kanda Bongo Man, Zairian singer, Georges Momboye, choreographer, then with José Montalvo and Dominique Hervieu, Jérôme Deschamps and Macha Makeieff. With these different companies, she participates in numerous tours in France and abroad. Alongside her activities as a choreographer and dancer, Chantal Loïal continues to pass on her knowledge and passion. She does this with an intact dynamism and enthusiasm, in collaboration with the dancers and musicians of her company, through workshops, courses, dance conferences and animation of West Indian balls.

In 2008, she obtained her state diploma in contemporary dance from the Centre national de la danse in Pantin. In recognition of her career as a dancer and choreographer, she received the Legion of Honour in March 2015 from the President of the French Republic, François Hollande, as well as the Medal of the City of Paris in 2018, presented by the Mayor of the 13th district in which the company is located.

Scroll down to our video library to watch a excerpt of one of their classes.

Diamano Coura is a not-for-profit community African arts organisation with a cultural focus. Located at the Malonga Casquelourd Center for the Arts in the City of Oakland, the Company is dedicated to: The preservation, education, and appreciation of traditional West African music, dance, theatre, and culture through public benefit ventures.

The mission of Diamano Coura is to provide global audiences access to the richness of indigenous African cultural tapestry through professional classes, performances, and the accurate depiction and perpetuation of African folklore indigenous Senegal, Guinea, Mali, Liberia, and Ivory Coast, whereby it can be understood and appreciated by all. Diamano Coura is committed to partnering with other artists and community members to use the inherent power of the arts to break barriers that stagnate to open corridors that encourage social and economic development, while fostering health and spiritual health and well-being. Diamano Coura in the Senegalese Wolof language means "those who bring the message.”

Ibrahima O. Diouf is a distinguished choreographer and the creative director of Diamano Coura West African Dance Company, a beacon of African culture and artistic excellence. With a career that began at the tender age of 12, Ibrahima has developed a profound expertise in traditional African dance, enriched by his work with prominent dance companies and esteemed choreographers across the globe.

Scroll down to our video library to watch a excerpt of one of their classes.