Ground Zero (GZ) Dance Group recently paid a courtesy visit to Senior Tourism Operations Officer III Cesar Sulit Jr., chief of South Cotabato Arts, Culture, Tourism and Museum (ACTM) Promotions Unit to present their glass trophy as Champion in the Hip-Hop Dance Convention (HHDC) Competition, which is under the auspices of De La Salle University (DLSU) – La Salle Dance Company Street.
Billy Sotillo, a Koronadal City-based choreographer, shared their experiences to Sulit as one of the attendees of the 3-day convention that was held at Dance Vision Arena, San Juan City, Metro Manila, with more than 200 delegates in attendance with some coming from as far as Japan, USA, Singapore and Latvia.
“The dance competition revolved on the blanket as the main concept which the group performed in less than 3 minutes during the opening day (February 3). With only 3 groups accepting the challenge, GZ wowed the crowd and got the judges nod,” Sotillo narrated, while showing the recorded video of their performance to this writer.
“They were then acclaimed as the first HHDC champion with unanimous decision coming from the judges.’ Soillo added.
As champion, the group’s choreographer Kervin Bartolo, will be treated to an 8-day free all-expense trip to Singapore. The other GZ members are Mark Vincent Timbal, Renzo Jan Pedel, Jeffrey Daloz and Elly Jhon de Guzman.
Aside from group competition, the group also joined “The Battle”, a 30-seconder individual free-style dance contest in which all 5 GZ dancers landed on the Top 32 among the more than a hundred participants.
During the Philippine National Dance Contest (Sayaw Pinoy) held December 1 -3 last year at the South Cotabato Gymnasium and Cultural Center, GZ landed first runner-up in the Contemporary category, while other winners from South Cotabato are Extreme Dancers (Champion-Hip-Hop) and Medal Kolon Datal (4th runner-up-Folk Dance).
South Cotabato provincial government provided financial assistance to GZ for the HHDC activity.
