Spotlight | It’s Showtime NYC

Welcome to Broadway Stages’ Spotlight, where we feature local shops, restaurants, organizations, individuals, and venues that provide goods and services to our community. This week, we are proud to promote It’s Showtime NYC, a program of Street/Club Dancers from the Bronx-based 501 c-3 non-profit organization Dancing in the Streets. Everyone loved their performances, talent and energy at the Kingsland Wildflower Festival at Broadway Stages’ green garden rooftop, and we know you will too!

People have danced since the first person beat a rhythm on a log. Dance has evolved with time and space but most of all with the music it accompanies. Fifty years ago this summer, a new style of music was pioneered at a party in the Bronx… welcome Hip-Hop!. And with the birth of Hip-Hop came a new style of dance that  started in the streets and quickly spread to the clubs. Broadway Stages celebrated this dance form this summer at the 7th Annual Kingsland Wildflower Festival with It’s Showtime NYC.

Founded in 1984, It’s Showtime NYC is a program of the Bronx-based 501 c-3 non-profit organization Dancing in the Streets. Since its founding, Dancing in the Streets has produced 600+ public performances in unexpected places, introducing audiences to unexplored spaces, communities, cultures, and dance forms. 

It’s Showtime NYC cultivates creative excellence within the next generation of Street/Club Dancers. In a challenging economy, artistic pursuits are often squeezed out, but their efforts provide unique experiences connected to careers within the dance and performing arts world.

Moreover, they advocate for and highlight the recognition of Street/Club Dances as seminal American art forms and folkloric movement cultures within the performing arts sector.

Dance is more than just an expression of momentary joy accompanied by music. It can be a vital expression of self for a vulnerable population. This is why It’s Showtime NYC seeks to become a leading talent incubator for Street/Club Dancers in the NYC metro area.

They invest in the dancers’ creative maturity, build community, create space for future ambassadors in Street/Club Dance, and spread the dance forms through schools, stages, studios, and the screen.

Support helps street dancers find a better footing in their artistic careers in NYC and infuse more of their voices into the larger dance landscape. Through It’s Showtime NYC, dancers gain access to the larger cultural economy through performances, local street dance tourism initiatives, teaching, commercial work, and paid administrative work within the organization.

If you are so inclined, they would greatly appreciate your financial support. Your tax-deductible donation goes toward paid weekly rehearsals, professional development opportunities, work opportunities for our dancers, and artistic commissions for the dancers to create new works.

You can also support them by following them on Instagram and Facebook. On their pages, you can see the value of their work, enjoy clips of their performances, and stay informed about where they will be teaching or performing next!

There is an Indian Proverb, “To watch us dance is to hear our hearts speak.” Broadway Stages was spellbound watching It’s Showtime NYC perform, and we can say their hearts didn’t just speak. They sang. We encourage you to follow their work, and support local artists!