Legacy

Instead of ballet slippers, the four dancers pull on high tops with the lips kicked out. Their uniforms are skin-tight leggings and a raw New Orleans confidence. The cheers don’t simmer when the music starts, but embolden the melody and buoy the women’s presence within LSU’s cavernous Cotillion Ballroom. The dancers’ movements are sharp, intense, following rap’s pulsing, jutting cadence. As the music slows to softer hip-hop, the harsh geometry of limbs melts into swaying torsos, arching arms and mournful hips. Shadows bleed like ink onto the stage, pouring a soulful fusion of intricate hip-hop and accents of contemporary dance into the spotlight.

Limbs drip poetry with every leap, turn, glide and lock as the Legacy Dancers make the final performance for LSU’s Harambee ceremony lauding African-American student life and culture.

Legacy is LSU’s hip-hop dance crew and an active student organization on campus.

With 14 members, Legacy performs regularly for National Pan-Hellenic Council sorority and fraternity events and pageants, the LSU Dance Concert, Delta Sigma Theta Fashion Show, Fall Fest and the Harambee ceremony. During homecoming events last year, Legacy won the title as LSU’s Best Dance Crew.

The crew also competes across Louisiana each year, including Southeastern University’s talent show, the Infinity Dance Competition and Halloween Showcase  fundraiser at University of Louisiana-Lafayette.

Diversity of hip-hop

Business management junior and three-year member Kelsey Finocchiaro is Legacy’s current president. She leads Legacy’s rehearsals an average of nine hours each week, sometimes rehearsing after midnight until the dances are precise.

“We’re not the Tiger Girls, we’re not the Golden Girls, but we work just as hard,” Finocchiaro said. “We’re serious about dancing.”

Every performance consists of five different routines in one song, allowing the group flexibility to explore all the emotions of hip-hop’s unique corporal spectrum. Members are not guaranteed a spot in each dance, as the group holds auditions for dances before each performance.

“We never repeat dances,” said Finocchiaro. “We’re literally learning a new dance every rehearsal.”

Although Legacy’s focus is hip-hop, Finocchiaro said the diversity of crew members helps incorporate other styles into their routines. Following tryouts mid-September, the crew consists of 12 women and two men.

“We have people that can do any genre,” said Finocchiaro. “We have tap dancers, jazz, hip-hop, and members that specialize in ballet. We have acrobats and tumblers.”

However, Finocchiaro, a native of New Jersey, said the group must also explore the diversity within hip-hop.

“We can have really mellow and soft hip-hop, and we can have hard and masculine hip-hop,” said Finocchiaro. “It has a lot of contrast. It’s dancing to tell a story.”

The bonds of hip-hop

Legacy is not limited to its active members, as former members frequently return to choreograph or perform with the group. Public relations junior Lindsey Legros, Legacy’s current vice-president and two-year member, said old members help run the auditions and are still included beyond graduation.

“Once you’re Legacy, you’re always Legacy,” said Legros, who was one of the four Legacy dancers who performed at the Harambee ceremony.

Former active member and LSU alumnus Emmanuel Washington echoed Legros’ description of Legacy’s sense of family.

“It started as a way out — a time away from life,” said Washington. “Most of us didn’t have time or money to put towards a formal dance studio.”

Washington said dancing in the LSU Dance Concert was his most memorable performance with Legacy. The dance concert had been an annual event for 10 years, and never had a hip-hop performance.

Although Legacy is not a part of the LSU dance ensemble, Washington said the invitation to dance and approval of the Dance Department was fulfilling. Legacy danced a contemporary piece which weaved in elements of hip-hop.

“It was a breakthrough for a lot of us,” said Washington. “People got to see us as dancers, not just a dance crew.”

Washington describes Legacy’s dance style as an urban hip-hop, influenced by Los Angeles, however, there’s plenty of room for interpretation.

“The hip-hop style depends on the artist and song. If the music is gritty and dirty, the choreography has to match,” said Washington.

As the music evolves, Legacy evolves.

“Hip-hop dance is a cultural movement in itself. It’s never steady. It’s more of a trend — whatever’s hot at the time,” said Washington.

Members enjoy performing, and Finocchiaro describes dancing with Legacy as energizing.

“Right before we go on stage, we pray together,” said Finocchiaro. “When we get on stage, we connect. It’s an adrenaline rush.”

Roots of Legacy

Tamika Jett co-founded Legacy Dancers in 2003 during her first semester at LSU with four other New Orleans natives. She served as president in her final year before graduating with a degree in broadcast journalism.

Forming the dance crew was a way to bring together dancers specifically to learn hip-hop techniques.

“Hip-hop is a culture,” said Jett. “[It] is dance, rap, art — anything expressive.”

Jett, a New Orleans native, said she was displaced from her home after Hurricane Katrina. The hurricane also claimed Benjamin School of Dance, where she studied for 13 years.

“When we started Legacy, we were expressing how we felt because we just came from losing homes,” said Jett. “It was real raw.”

Jett said her education in hip-hop style started with Legacy, and the group’s New Orleans roots create a tough, intense interpretation expressed through early choreography. Unlike New York and California, Louisiana dance studios are neither as accessible nor prominent for aspiring dancers to master styles and get noticed.

As New Orleans continues to rebuild post-Katrina, developing a solid community in the arts has been a struggle. Jett, now 24-years-old, founded Passion Dance studio in New Orleans in 2009, but continues to intermittently choreograph for Legacy.

Finocchiaro has been dancing since she started in a ballet-tap combination class at the age of three, and said dancing hip-hop with Legacy has been an education of hip-hop’s variety across state lines.

“With the New Orleans choreographers, it’s a lot more sharp and precise. The movements are more hard-hitting,” said Finocchiaro. “When I came here, I thought this hip-hop was more buck, more ghetto.”

And though the group began eight years ago with dancers from New Orleans, now members from Los Angeles to New York can bring their dancing perspective to Legacy.

“The more people that start to choreograph, the more we evolve,” said Finocchiaro.

Beyond the Dance Crew

Former Legacy president, vice-president and sociology graduate Washington described his first year on the crew as “horrifying” and a “culture shock” when the first-time dancer and Lake Charles native was plunged into hip-hop by the founding group of New Orleans dancers.

“Legacy evolved from being a fun way to dance what we want to a serious devotion,” Washington said. “We took pride in our organization and started competing, travelling, dancing for local artists and in music videos.”

Legacy members have choreographed and danced in music videos for artists like Kenteon Davis, and Chandy, who works under the producer of Lil’ Wayne’s “Lollipop” video, Darius Harrison (“Deezle”). These artists discovered Legacy after watching the group perform live, Washington said.

He said Legacy is a good outlet for dancers who still want to focus on their studies, without any mandatory early-morning rehearsals.

“Legacy keeps dancers in class, molded and grounded,” said Washington.

Legacy’s performance at Fall Fest this year was a “huge deal” to the group, according to current president Finocchiaro, who said the group wants to become more known around the community.

“We’re getting places, we’re getting noticed,” said Finocchiaro. “We just want to keep having fun, keep dancing.”