User:Alchemydance

THE EARLY YEARS Marchant Birch was born in Cape Town, South Africa in 1973. He grew up surrounded by the sound of the Cape Town Minstrel Carnival musicians and Jazz artists. After a school demo by a junior dance team, he was drawn into the world of ballroom dance at the age of 7. Under the tutelage of Gideon Phineas and Doreen Matthews he went on to win hundreds of trophies as a junior ballroom dancer in competitions all over South Africa.

BOOGIE DANCING In the 1980's 'Boogie Dancing' (street jazz) became a craze in Cape Town. Marchant was brought into this form of dancing through theatre recreations of 'Thriller' by Michael Jackson, where he would play lead role. His brother Bradley was part of this young team of dancers, whose talent was shining bright as a dancer and choregrapher. Bradley formed a team called 'The Cool Boys' who won every major competition in the genre of Boogie Dancing at the time. Marchant picked up a lot of choreographic skills from Bradley, but would only go on to use it many years later when he came into the world of salsa.

HIP-HOP Under the apartheid regime in South Africa, Hip Hop became a major form of communcation between young people of colour. The political messages of the African American groups such as Public Enemy and KRS One reached the youth of the Cape Town townships and resonated with them and their situation in South Africa. Being part of this young community, Marchant was drawn to this art-form, and became a major activist for this cause. A club in Cape Town called The Base was a meeting place for Hip Hop artists with the same frame of mind. It was here that Marchant met many artists that he worked with and exchanged ideas with for delivering the message to the young people in South Africa as an MC and producer. One of the most significant people that Marchant met at The Base was Shaheen Ariefdien of the hip hop group Prophets of Da City (POC).POC were major activists in initiating change in people of colours' political consciousness. Marchant worked closely with them as part of the African Hip Hop Movement in spreading the anti-apartheid message amongst the youth in South Africa. To this day Shaheen is an inspiration to Marchant in creativity, musicality and expression.

CAPE JAZZ

SALSA In 2000, Marchant moved to the UK and was introduce to salsa dancing. Being a dance he picked up very naturally and quickly, he was soon invited to teach and perform within the salsa community. Over the next few years he found his influences in the New York salsa dance artist such as Eddie Torres, Nelson Flores, Juan Matos and Frankie Martinez. Subsequently, Marchant drew from those influences along with his previous dance and musical dance background and went on to develop his own way of dancing salsa. This is a method incorporating the smooth techniques of the ballroom foxtrot, rhythmic sensitivity of his african musical background, and New York mambo. In 2005, he formed Alchemy Dance Company as a mode of bringing this method to the stage, and in 2006 Alchemy Dance Academy - a way of bringing it to the general salsa public. The method has become known as the 'Alchemy Way'.