Leon Tha Lion and his All Styles Dance Battle

I'm here with Leon the Lion here at the All Styles annual battle.

He says that it's a, the name is a work in progress, right? [laughs]

So my name is Leon, AKA Leon the Lion, and this is my ninth annual All Styles dance event.

So what it is is right now my name changes, not my name, but the event name changes every year based on the businesses I've collaborated with.

I've worked with businesses that involve lowriders, graffiti artists, and now this year I was able to, uh, collaborate with this location, the G Spot Base out here in San Jose, California, and they have 16 different food trucks, so it always changes based on who I collaborate with.

But yeah, it's always a free All Styles dance event.

It's always for the dance, uh, dance community and the whole community of all in San Jose, and it's always free.

So for people who don't already know you and follow you on Instagram, tell me a little bit about yourself, like, uh, what city you're from, and how did you get into turf dancing and how did this whole event come about?

Okay, sure.

Okay, so a little bit about me first.

I started dancing off like any other kid.

I was watching YouTube, The Forest, Michael Jackson, and then I started taking dance classes, but then I started noticing like, all right, this is something I really want to do for like my job.

That's how I seen it.

It was like if I could go wake, work up, like wake up and like work every day and be a dancer, that would be it.

So I took it s- that serious when I was a kid, and now since then I've been able to be in music videos, performances.

I just did a, a BET performance out in Los Angeles, California for the BET Experience.

I've done Tyga, YG, Snoop Dogg music videos.

But now, uh, as a 19-year-old, I get to be a professional street dancer and content creator.

I help, uh, businesses like Hot Heads promote their clothing, and I help local businesses like restaurants and other clothing brands promote, of course, their food and their entity and their business, but also other bigger clothing brands like Pro Club, the T-shirt Company, and Cookies SF.

Those are some of my biggest collaborators and sponsors.

So earlier today before this dance battle that we had, you were telling me a little bit about the very first dance battle event-

Yes

... that you started.

I thought this was a really amazing, uh, story.

I didn't wanna miss out on it or anyone else miss out on it.