Originally published in The Towerlight October 16, 2008. Photos by Kristofer Marsh, who won 3rd place for Region 2 in the Society of Professional Journalists’ 2009 Mark of Excellence Awards.

Baltimore’s Inner Harbor is known for a lot of things. Crab cakes, boats, tourist traps… breakdancing?

Nestled between the National Aquarium’s ambient music and natural sounds on one side of the water and the occasional gospel choir performance on the other is a boom box blasting Daft Punk, Michael Jackson or whatever can be danced to.

Several Towson students, including senior electronic media and film major Sean Johnson, have gained recognition and earned hundreds of dollars in tips by breakdancing downtown.

Johnson, who performs under the nickname “Blak Majik,” has been breakdancing for four years. He said he started breaking when a friend, Danny “Atomic Goofball” Nguyen, introduced him to the culture.

“He told me where I could go to meet people to break and just pretty much he got me into the culture,” he said. “I learned the basics from him and took it from there.”

Johnson said his interest in music and art drew him into the breakdancing, or b-boy, scene.

As he honed his talent and started learning things he didn’t think he could do before, Johnson became immersed in the b-boy culture.

“It’s not just like breakdancing is breakdancing,” he said. “There’s actually a culture behind hip-hop, and just being a part of that kind of pulls you in the more you get involved with it. And after that it becomes like a way of life.”

He traces the history back to the origins of hip-hop and its four elements – the DJ, the rapper, the breakdancers and the graffiti artists – as opposed to the gang-influenced music that later became popular.

“The whole idea behind hip-hop was to be a positive thing as opposed to the gangs that were overtaking the boroughs in New York, which was the negative side,” he said.

Johnson has more than one of those elements covered. In addition to dancing, he is the programming director for XTSR, the student-run Internet radio station. He is an experienced DJ, and said he first joined the station to gain more experience and run his own show. Today, he can occasionally be found working the turntables outside the Media Center or on the Speaker’s Circle with XTSR.

Johnson also became involved with Towson’s Groove Crew, an SGA-affiliated group that practices Tuesday and Wednesday evenings on the stage at Paws.

“I guess you could say we called it a club because we needed an excuse to be able to go to Paws. Other than that the school would say, ‘Hey, you guys can’t use this space,’” he said.

Johnson described the Baltimore breakdancing scene as a tight-knit community. Towson’s Groove Crew has a very good relationship with other local teams of breakdancers, he said.

Earlier this year, Johnson was invited by the Baltimore b-boy crew The Regulators to join them at the Inner Harbor on weekends, where they performed throughout the summer. The Regulators are well-respected on the Baltimore breakdancing scene, with some members who have 10 years of experience, and two members who performed in the film “Step Up 2: The Streets.”

Johnson said he enjoys being able to show off for the large crowds that gather downtown, and he even gives a few quick lessons to children and their parents.

“You see it in their faces,” he said. “I guess they stop kind of in awe the same way that anyone else does when they see us at Paws up here.”

Johnson has also performed at Baltimore’s annual Artscape festival and recently landed a contract to perform at the Verizon Center in Washington, D.C., during Washington Capitals games.

“I love music. I’ve always loved music,” he said. “I like dancing, and more than anything else, it’s because I want to try to be better than I was the day before. It’s just like every time I’m doing something it’s like, ‘You know what, I’ve never tried this before, let me try it now and see if it works.’ You’re kind of competing against yourself.”