Kaba Modern & Founder Arnel Calvario

Dance crews have been a staple of life for the American youth for quite some time now.  With the advent of America’s Best Dance Crew, the modern dance craze has been elevated to a whole new level.  A myriad of dance groups have graced the stage and battled their hearts out to be America’s Best Dance Crew.  In the end, although only one crew can be crowned the champs, it’s the effort, journey, and the story behind each dance crew which gives deeper meaning to the show and brings the human element out in this competition.

 The dance crew that we’ll be featuring in this article is called Kaba Modern.  The Kaba Modern story began at UC Irvine in the Spring of 1992.  It started when Arnel Calvario asked the president of the Filipino club at UCI, called Kaba, (short for Kababayan, which translates into countryman) if he and some fellow club members could do a modern dance routine for the Filipino cultural night.  The Kaba president jokingly told Arnel to go ahead and make some flyers for the dance performance.  At the time, Arnel didn’t know that the president was only kidding.  So as it turns out, Arnel got the flyers made and his promotion began.  By the time the news got back to the president of KABA, the modern dance routine was already booked as part of the cultural night experience.  And therefore, we have the beginning of Kaba Modern and more importantly the beginning of a dance revival within the Filipino community itself.  “Some of the best things are created on accident,” says Arnel. 

 Kaba Modern then showcased their talents during the half time show at the Friendship Games in the Fall of 1992.  The Friendship Games are held annually at Cal State Fullerton and hosted by PASA.  PASA is the Filipino club of CSUF.  The KABA performance mesmerized the crowd of over 2,000 Filipino college students from various Filipino clubs.  These clubs drove and flew in to Fullerton from all over the US in order to meet, bond, network, and compete in friendly and lighthearted games.  All I can say is that this dance performance changed the Friendship Games forever.  The Kaba Modern performance spawned all sorts of new dance crews within the Filipino college club community.  The Kaba dance moves throughout the performance were intricate, lively, precise, and hard hitting.  The music that brought the flavor to the stage was mixed and composed by none other than the legendary DJ Melo-D.

 Fast forward over 15 years later and Kaba Modern is still a dance crew in the spotlight.  When the competition began for ABDC, Kaba Modern bolstered a crew of 7 which included Andrew Simbol, Mike Song, Allison Vicentio, Yuri Tag, Lawrence Kao, Cindy Minowa and Jonathan Badanguio.  As the filming began for the show, a major road blocked occurred that knocked the 3 Filipino dancers out of the competition.  ABDC required a major change in lifestyle.  That lifestyle change meant living in a hotel and being away from a normal life for 3 months straight.  The 3 Filipino dancers, who were part of the original crew of 7, could not make the commitment due to various reasons and as a consequence had to leave the competition.  Here lies the reason why there were no Filipino dancers representing Kaba Modern.  With their departure came an opportunity for 2 other Kaba Modern dancers to join the ones already in the competition.  The 2 members that joined the Kaba Modern battle crew were Tony Tran and Jia Huang.  Arnel says that the ABDC experience helped diversify the face of the hip hop dance culture due to the exposure and success of the many Asian groups involved. Some of those groups include the season 1 champions, the JabaWockeez, along with Kaba Modern, and Team Millennia.  When you watch every season of ABDC you’ll find that the Asian dance crews usually fair more than well.  It’s brought a whole new level of respect to the Asian culture in regards to hip hop and modern dance.

 Kaba Modern is now diversified into 3 groups.  First off, there is Kreative Movement, which is for the youth ages 17 and younger.  Next, there’s Kaba Modern, which is the competitive dance group at UCI.  Lastly, we have Kaba Legacy, which is the professional dance company that is paid to perform and do showcases.  Kaba legacy is comprised of many different professional back grounds which include doctors and engineers.  The entire battle group that represented Kaba Modern during ABDC is now part of Kaba Legacy.  It’s almost like going through a school system where you graduate and then go to the next level.

 “Kaba emphasizes family as much as it does artistry” says Arnel.  He also went on to say that, “It’s been a complete blessing to share artistry and encouragement for everyone to realize that we all have a unique talent to share, but it’s your choice with what you do with your talent that matters.”  I’m glad that Arnel made the decision to share his dance talent 18 years ago.  In my opinion, that 1 decision played a major role in regards to the evolution of hip hop and modern dance within the Filipino community and more importantly a major role in where modern dance is at today. 

Neil Estrada