Dancer Spotlight: Rino Nakasone!!!!!

Well its time for another awesome dancer spotlight. The lovely Rino Nakasone! I stumbled across you tube vids of Rino whilst looking up another one of my fave dancers Ivan Koumaev. You should definitely click on that link. This is before Ivan was on SYTYCD and got all famous. He was just a kid taking classes…taking Rinos class. I think because Rino and I are the same age, I get where she is coming from. Although she’ll dance to current music, the feel is totally old school. And sometimes she goes back in the bag with songs too. I’ve seen her make up routines to Bobby Brown, and Prince from the Batman era. I can tell that 90’s dance and music were just as epic to her as they were to me. I just love everything about her! She pulls off boy swagger, but is still super feminine and sexy. She is the queen of New Jack Swing. Oh…and shes one of Gwen Stefani’s Harajuku Girls. She’s “Music“. Did I forget to mention that? Yeah…like I said…skills.

This video is the first one I saw of Rino. Its her choreography and its dope! She packs a lot of energy, makes great faces and has an old school flavor that I love. FYI: Ivan is on the left in the black t-shirt killin this routine. I heart him.



So in the beginning I had no idea that Rino was a Harajuku Girl. It took me a while to figure it out. And I knew that those girls were fantastic dancers but in the Gwen videos they weren’t really showcased that much. I’m sure they had much more to do in the stage shows, but having never seen one, I was disappointed in the quick cuts of her videos. I couldn’t see the flippin choreography. Which is of course a gripe only a person obsessed with dance would have…but you get the point. So this is a video I’ve watched a billion times over. Its “Music” doing an interview about being a Harajuku Girl and they cut away to Rino free styling to Gwen Stefani’s song “Luxurious”. One, it made me love this song…this video is all I think about when I hear it. Two, Rinos freestyle is SICK. I’ve never seen anyone dance this way to that song…ever. I wouldn’t even know it could be done. The first two dance parts blow my mind. The talking parts are weird…Rino is speaking in Japanese in the interview, but doing her own overdub in English. But never mind that part…just watch the dancing ya’ll!



You may have also seen Rino on America’s Best Dance Crew season 3. She was in the runner up group “Beat Freaks”. They lost to “Quest Crew“. It was an winner take all battle of the sexes…all girls crew vs. all boys crew. And just because its my blog I’m going to break my no more than three video per entry rule and show two more videos. I want you to see how Rino can bring the sexy, and then bring the stank. First the sexy.



Now the stank. Rino is on the right in the green cap. And I’m just going to say that I love it when girls dance in boys clothes…its something I’ve always done and it just looks right to me. I really can’t dance in much else. Rino can dance in anything I’m sure…but it seems like she prefers the baggy and I’m into it.



So that wraps up this dancer spotlight. Check out more Rino on you tube or a Gwen Stefani show or with Beat Freaks and stay inspired! Peace!