Youth minister uses dance to keep kids in church

On a peaceful afternoon in a Chesapeake garage, Demetrus Leslie jerked like he was dosed with strychnine. His arms lashed menacingly, then he dropped to the floor, only to rear up smoothly. // His chest popped in and out, convulsing as if an alien larva heaved within. He ranged around the garage, "traveling," or following the direction of his foot stomps and arm swings.

"Go, go!" yelled admiring friends over music, loud without melody and as rhythmic as a skipping rap record.

In his spontaneity, speed and mesmerized concentration, they could see the tell-tale symptoms. Demetrus had got krump. Praise the Lord!

Twice a week, 17-year-old Demetrus and members of his Kreative Mindz Crew: The Syfer Family can be found in the garage, spinning and stomping and jabbing and getting lost in krump. The frenetic dance, born on the West Coast, combines flashes of modern dance, break-dancing, tribal-like dance, hip-hop, "pop-lock" steps and free-form motion, often at blurring speed.

Some krumpers have a nearly religious passion for the dance, but Demetrus and his friends say krump is all about God.

"When you going the fastest, that's when you unleash, that's when God takes over," Demetrus said.

When's he's on the floor, 15-year-old Jaren Goodridge shoots jabs in all directions, pops his cap up in the air and delivers a frantic pantomime timed to the music.

"When we're throwing a jab, that's praise right there," Jaren said. "And when we read the Bible and talk about God and spread his word, that's praise."

"How would I describe krump?" said Danyasius Leslie, 29, the group's founder. "It's the power of God that moves."

Leslie started Kreative Mindz two years ago with his brother, Demetrus, and some friends. He was inspired by "Rize," a 2005 documentary on krump, the expressive, freestyle dance that caught on in California in the 1990s as an alternative to street violence, with dancers competing or "battling" to display their moves.

For Leslie, KRUMP stands for Kingdom Radicals Uplifting Mighty Praise.

He came to the dance as he was starting anew, after a glut of drinking and stealing. He returned home, became a regular at New Light Full Gospel Baptist Church and said he became saved as a Christian. He felt called to ministry and found it in krump.

Leslie and friends practiced in his parents' garage, cutting dance moves next to the weed-whacker and a tool bench.

Neighborhood kids stared in fascination. Leslie - who works at a car wash and at his own in-home travel agency - began recruiting for Kreative Mindz, setting conditions for membership.

One rule is to keep up with schoolwork. "I don't look for C's and D's, I look for A's and B's," said Leslie, who often checks in with parents about teens' grades. Dancers are on probation until they comply with the crew's standards.

Leslie also expects them to make Jesus Christ their model and read Bible passages daily. "God has me writing up Scriptures for them and passing them out," he said. The twice-weekly dance practices start with prayer.

Dancers are expected to go to church, either their own or to New Light in Virginia Beach.

Bishop Rudolph B. Lewis said he understands krump no better than his parents' generation understood Elvis Presley's risque swivel-hips in the '50s.

"We traditionals will say, 'Oh, ungodly!' " Lewis said. But he's told members it's better for youth to speak out by krumping in church than by joining a gang.

"God wants to hear what you want to say, and he don't care how you say it, and if you say it like this" - Lewis contorted himself, krumplike - "he hears you."

Krump's style is radical compared with typical liturgical or praise dance.

"Praise dance teams are very lyrical, ethereal, soft. They follow a modern or jazz structure," said Norfolk State University dance professor Glendola Mills-Parker. Krump, by contrast, "is a pure street form, being done in church."

But she said krumpers who feel the spirit when they're absorbed in their dance are no different than worshippers who writhe while "shouting" in church. Both transcend their earthly surroundings. Both are considered bogus if they're not infused with raw emotion perceptible to onlookers.

"If they don't feel what you're trying to portray, that aggression or intensity, then you're just moving," Mills-Parker said. "We say it's 'play shouting.' "

Krump's spiritual dimension may not be apparent immediately to the uninitiated spectator.

"It's a unique, difficult-type dance, and to be honest, you cannot begin to understand it watching for 30 minutes," Leslie said. "You have to follow it."

That seemed a dead-on assessment on a recent afternoon as a half-dozen of the crew deployed at the house Leslie shares with his family.

In the garage, a couple sat while others formed a horseshoe around the krumper of the moment.

Lithe Jaren looked like a caffeine fiend, slender arms swinging, bending and jabbing triple-time. One motion flowed into the next, his gaze fixed on the floor. His friends whooped encouragement.

Brandon Smith, 16, took the floor next, jerking his body parts like a robot, then threateningly thrashing his arms out like an angry man arguing without a word.

Leslie followed. Arms and hips snapped in different directions. He spun on the ball of a foot, staring down, then leaped across the floor like an erupting Vesuvius.

Alexis Hinton shot wolfish looks, baring her teeth while stamping and clawing the air with outstretching arms. Despite the feminine bows on her red flats, she radiated anger.

Alexis, 14, admitted afterward that earlier in the day, a run-in with her science teacher left her pent-up with frustration.

"I just tried to get through it, but when I came to practice, I just got all that off my mind."

Each performance lasted one to three minutes, leaving dancers such as Nohnee Purvis breathless.

Nohnee, 16, said he first krumped for fun. But soon, "the whole spiritual thing of it just hit me in the chest."

"When you do it, when you krump, you feel like the spirit in you, you feel different. If you're mad and start krumping, you'll feel happy. It'll all go away, all your pain and everything."

Nohnee said he even acts differently. "Sundays, I'd just sit in the house, sleep, talk on the phone. Now I get up and go to church. My whole mind has changed. We got Christ up."

Steven G. Vegh, (757) 446-2417, steven.vegh@pilotonline.com