Chacho Valdez
Chacho has been Dancing seriously since Aug 2000. He has been training in the styles of B-Boying, HipHop and House Dance. First time he saw B-Boying was the movie Breakin’. He thought the moves were so cool but more importantly he loved how the B-Boys were expressing themselves. Later on he would find out about 3 B-boys (Marlon of Havikoro out of Texas, DoKnock of Battlemonkeys/Now Supercrew from California and Frankie Flave of LA Breakers/now Style Elements from California) that were coming to Applause Dance in Centerville, Ut to teach a 2 day workshop. Chacho was currently learning Capoeira (Brazilian Martial Art) at Applause, and Ashley Vilos daughter of the owner of Applause, handed him the Flyer and he transitioned slowly from Capoeira to B-boying after taking this workshop and traveling to his first out of state Jam Bboy Summit.
Being a shy introvert, Chacho found this form of expression as an outlet and way to say how he felt without even using his words. The more he studied and trained he found that B-Boying was 1/4 of a bigger Culture known to the world as Hip-Hop. Befriending two local B-Boys, Corey and Tony, forming his first crew “Dirty Hands”. This crew would practice in Tony’s Garage everyday and travel all over the USA attending learning and competing at various jams
Life happens and Chacho could no longer live close to his crew members who lived in Ogden as he lost his job and had to move back to live with his Grandmother Jenny Vee (RIP) in Bountiful. So he had to find another place to practice. The only place close enough was SLC’s Mecca for HipHop Uprok. Chacho would go there to practice everyday he could wether it was borrowing Grandmas Car or finding change to bus himself from Bountiful to SLC. Uprok has been a practice spot for many Bboys and Bgirls since the early 90s. He would only see AOD there everyday while others would come so often. Chacho would practice with them and eventually be offered a spot with AOD. It was a tough decision to make and of course he have to eventually tell Dirty Hands that he needed to do what made sense for his situation and Join AOD.
AOD spent hours at Uprok training and perfecting their skills to go and Compete with the Best in the world at jams like Freestyle Session, Underdog and many more. AOD along side Uprok would throw monthly by jams at Uprok helping grow the Bboy scene to a few to the many. Eventually AOD would go their separate ways some moving to Vegas and Hawaii while the rest stayed back home.
In 2005 Chacho would find House dance and would self teach himself using YouTube as a now source to learn until he could travel to New York to train. A couple of years later, after traveling, Chacho met a DJ named Danny Dance at a club called W Lounge. Danny Dance and Chacho started a night at the SLC Library called House Night. Every Monday Chacho would go and Train and teach friends and passers by about House Dance all while Danny Dance would play. After Danny Dance Moved, Chacho took the mantel and has been running House Night ever since.
Chacho now is a current member and one of the founders of Flavanoids along with the crews first members Monkee, Killabee and Munk. Chacho also started a group called House of Flava. People who preserve and love all styles of HipHop and acknowledge people who have given a lot to the culture and help Utah grow to the dance scene it is today.
He is also a Bboy and Hiphop Dance Instructor at The School of Dance SLC. With the help of the School of Dance, he has built an amazing Bboy / Bgirl program that serves kids all over the State. Helping them not only with dance but also helping them be good people for the future and giving the the encouragement to come out of their shell to express themselves and gain confidence as he once did when he started so many years ago and still does to this day.
Acknowledgments
- 2002 Winter Olympics Closing Ceremonies with Earth, Wind and Fire
- Opening act for Jabbawokees when they performed at SLCC taylorsville campus
- Opening act for Poreotics when the performed at UofU Marriot Center For Dance
- 2019 Most Influential Dancer voted by Utah’s Dance Community
- 2007 X-Series Bboy 7 to Smoke winner
- 2019 Return of the Cypher Assault 7 to Smoke Allstyles Winner
- Bboy Federation League Champions along with AOD
- Trickonometry 2 (California) Bboy Champions with AOD
- Past House Dance Director for Underground Crew
- Current House Dance Director for Junction Dance Co.
- Choreographer for They Reminisce