Xzibit Young Creatives 2022

The team behind Xzibit Young Creatives are delighted to announce that a new intensive programme for aspiring young hip hop dance creators is now open for applications.

Providing opportunities once again for young people to develop and progress their dance making and choreography skills.

What is Xzibit Young Creatives?
Xzibit Young Creatives is an artist-led hip hop dance theatre project that focuses on developing the young creatives of the future through an intensive choreographic mentoring programme. It offers mentoring from internationally renowned choreographers including Gareth Woodward and Jasmine Eccles (Xzibit Young Creatives), Kenrick Sandy MBE (Boy Blue Entertainment) and Jonzi D (Breakin’ Convention), amongst others.

The project is designed to provide opportunities for the young people involved to present their own work to live audiences in professional venues. It is suitable for those who have some dance experience and an interest in hip hop.

First conceived in 2011, with the very first talent development project taking place in 2012, Xzibit Young Creatives has successfully been rolled out across the East Midlands every year since. The team behind the project, Artistic Director and Mentor Gareth Woodward and Co-Mentor Jasmine Eccles, have worked to scale-up the programme with Executive Producer Amy Dalton-Hardy, using time during the pandemic to undertake significant development work on the future of the project. Arts Council England has now invested funding from National Lottery Project Grants, showing an unprecedented level of support for hip hop dance in the Midlands.

Apply to Xzibit Young Creatives 2022
Applications to take part in the talent development programme for 11 to 19 year olds from across the East and West Midlands are now open via the Xzibit Young Creatives website.

Taster workshops and selection days for the project will take place in Birmingham and Nottingham in December. From these workshops, ten young people will be taken on as choreographers, with more being selected as dancers.

For a duration of 12 weeks starting from January 2022, full day workshops will take place every weekend in both Birmingham and Nottingham.

The young choreographers and dancers will showcase their work at Lakeside Arts, Nottingham and the P atrick Centre, Birmingham in April 2022. Shorter intensive projects, where young creators and dancers can apply to participate will also take place in Lincoln, Corby, Leicester, Derby and Coventry between April and July 2022.