Philippe Almeida
Choreographer
February 2027
- Performing Arts
- New York
“There is never an end… There are always new sounds to imagine, new feeling to get at. And always, there is the need to keep purifying these feelings and sounds so that we can really see what we’ve discovered in its pure State.” – John Coltrane
For me, creating work is as important as teaching and expressing myself as a dancer. This vital impulse guides my current choreographic project, Call-Trane, scheduled for 2027.
Deeply involved in the underground scene, I won numerous battles. An active member of major crews such as Section C and Serial Stepperz, I built a strong international reputation with Pro Phenomen. In 2013, driven by a desire to develop my own choreographic voice, I founded Cie MouvMatik and created three works—Boots, Weakness, and Insight Data—and two shows, KickXplicit and Hip Hop Story Show.
Philippe “Physs” Almeida is a leading figure in hip-hop in France and internationally, is a craftsman of movement. Active in hip-hop culture for more than twenty years, he is renowned for the quality of his dancing and his approach to teaching and artistic practice. Regarded as both a mentor and an older brother, he inspires a new generation of dancers. This has led him to focus on passing on knowledge and experience. For many years, he has taught at various institutions, including Flow Dance Academy Paris and the CFD in Cergy, where he co-directs the professional training program “Passeurs Culturels en danses hip hop,” established in 2018. Since January 2024, he has served on the expert committee of the Île-de-France Regional Directorate of Cultural Affairs (DRAC), contributing his insight into hip-hop dance.
After more than thirty years in hip-hop dance, I felt the need to return to one of its sources : improvisation. Tracing this thread back to jazz, I came across a photograph of John Coltrane. His gaze immediately reminded me of my late father, bringing unresolved grief back to the surface.
This collision gave rise to Call-Trane, a work that brings two stories of lineage into dialogue: the intimate bond connecting me to my father, and the relationship between hip-hop and jazz—two deeply interconnected cultures whose ties seem to have loosened over time.
Developing Call-Trane in the United States, particularly in New York, would allow me to ground my choreographic research in the African American history from which Coltrane’s music emerged. The city, which played a major role in his career, interests me as a meeting place for jazz heritage, diasporic cultures, and contemporary creation.
I want to explore how the struggles of the civil rights movement resonate today in questions of racial justice, the passing on of knowledge and experience, and the visibility of Black artists. These dynamics inform a question at the heart of my project : how can the body express the pursuit of freedom, collective power, and the spiritual dimension of John Coltrane’s music?
Encounters with New York’s artists and living histories would give this research substance and a dimension that listening to music alone cannot provide.
In partnership with
Seynod Auditorium