Koh Yamada, who goes by K.O., is Australia’s best street dancer. The title isn’t self-proclaimed, or even Complex-proclaimed—he earned this title after hundreds of people voted for him as the winner of Red Bull’s Dance Your Style Australian Final, hosted in Sydney in early September.
However, this isn’t K.O.’s first rodeo. He won the same competition in 2019, and went to Paris to compete in the world final. This time round, he’s headed to Johannesburg in December to battle it out once more against some of the world’s best street dancers.
At 22, his nascent dance career has already been marked by major successes—albeit his journey to the top has been both hard won and not without challenges. K.O. trained intensely in classical ballet during his childhood and teens, and his pivot towards becoming a street dancer required him to forgo many coveted opportunities, in pursuit of a dance career that felt more aligned with him.
K.O. sat down with Complex AU to chat about being well versed in multiple styles of dance, being the Australian Dance Your Style Finalist for the second time, and his advice for other dancers.
So, you’re officially Australia’s best street dancer, for the second time! How does it feel?
I mean, obviously this win means a lot, but you know, it’s just another day of dancing—it doesn’t really change who I am as a dancer or anything. The experience of being able to battle against other competitors around Australia, that was a really cool experience for me.
You’ve been in this position before, did you think you’d win again?
I wasn’t really expecting anything, to be honest. This competition is always different compared to the other ones because it’s crowd judged, whereas most other battles are judged by professional judges. So every time I do this comp, I go in with zero expectations. Like, I could be knocked out in the first round, who knows? It’s so different being judged by a few people vs hundreds of people, but yeah, honestly—it was a surprise.
Taking things back to the beginning, when did you become interested in dance and how did you get into it?
So I started dance at the age of four. My mum was a dancer, and she took me to my first dance class with my brother—I don’t remember anything from back then to be honest. But, the first proper style I got into was tap, which I really enjoyed. And then I guess after that I was like, “okay, maybe I should try Jazz,” so I tried Jazz and I enjoyed that. Each year, I would just start learning a new style of dance, and I just became really interested in it. My mum would also show me concert DVDs of Michael Jackson when I was really young, and just knowing that he was a superstar for his dancing—not just his singing—that really inspired me. So I just kept on doing it. It was also just fun.
It’s interesting to hear that you’ve experimented with a lot of different styles, because when I was watching you dance—you definitely come across as a dancer who’s fluent in multiple styles. Like, I saw you doing pirouettes and fouettés mid-battle—it was crazy. How do you think it’s helped you as a dancer—being well versed in multiple styles?
I guess because I would learn a new style almost every year growing up, I never really thought about it. But, as I got older, I definitely started to realise that each style sort of helps with another style. For example, I did a lot of classical training before I went into street dance, so having trained ballet quite intensely from a young age—I’d just built up natural muscles, and had a really strong understanding of my body. Especially doing ballet—ballet gives you a really good understanding of what your body can do, and it also increases flexibility and strength, as well as coordination and rhythm.
Tell me a bit more about your training in ballet? How did you make the transition from ballet into street dance?
Yeah, there was a point where I had to make a decision about whether I wanted to become a ballet dancer, or do what I’m doing now. As a ballet dancer, [boys] have to start training full-time at like age 13/14, and it takes 5-6 years to become a professional. So it takes a long time, and there’s this whole idea that’s like, if you’re gonna be a ballet dancer, you’ve just got to focus exclusively on ballet. So, for me, choosing between the two was a really tough decision. I didn’t feel pressured, but because I was training in ballet, a lot of my teachers really tried to push me to become a ballet dancer—but I loved everything.
It took me a few weeks to decide, but ultimately I was just like “I still love spinning on my back, and putting my tap shoes—I still love everything.” I just thought to myself, if I have the opportunity to do everything, I can still go to a ballet class, or incorporate ballet into contemporary works, you know? There are so many opportunities to use ballet.
When did you make that decision? And are you glad you did?
So, I got offered some scholarships to full-time schools when I was 14 and 15—one was the Australian Ballet School’s full-time program, and the other program I was offered was at the Alberta Ballet in Canada. That’s when [the people around me] were like, “okay, you have to make a decision.” I turned both down. In 2018 I also went on a school trip to America to audition for different colleges and universities, and along with that there were some other ballet schools that were offering scholarships. I got offered a bunch of scholarships in America, and one was from the Joffrey Ballet in New York.
In terms of whether or not I’m glad I made the decision to forgo those opportunities—yeah, I think so. I think I would’ve loved it either way, you know? I love ballet, and I’m sure I would’ve enjoyed it if I’d kept going. But being able to do anything I want is super freeing. I mean, the past couple of years, my schedule has been all over the place—like one day I’ll do a contemporary gig, and then the next day I’ll be doing a battle, (laughs).
With so many opportunities around you in your teenage years, it seems quite courageous, really, to turn them all down, and choose to honour what you wanted to do instead.
Yeah, I mean—it was tough. I had to say no to so many things. I could have said yes to anything. You know, sometimes I’ll have no work, so I’ll have to pop into doing casual jobs—because when you’re freelancing, you just never know when you’re going to get work. So yeah, it’s been up and down, but I’m happy with the decision I’ve made.
On par with the theme of you being a versatile dancer, you also dance to a lot of different music. Is there a particular genre you’re enjoying dancing to at the moment?
Yeah, I’ve really been diving into a lot of Jazz. I feel like Jazz is such a diverse genre—whether it’s Swing, Bebop, Classical Jazz, or Neo jazz—the [genre] just has so many different rhythm patterns. So yeah, I’ve been loving Jazz lately.
Switching gears, how are you feeling about going to the Dance Your Style World Final in Johannesburg this December?
I’m really excited to go to South Africa, I’ve never been. I really enjoyed going to the final in 2019 in Paris, and just meeting so many dancers that I’d never seen before. Usually when I go overseas for an event, I kind of know what to expect and I know who’s going to be at the event. But with Dance Your Style, meeting all the winners from different countries is so cool, and everyone’s so uniquely different and has their own flair. So I’m mainly excited to meet new dancers and connect with them—it’s super special.
When I was at the National Final and chatting to people in the crowd, a lot of people from the dance community spoke about you with such respect. There are dancers out there, and particularly younger dancers, who look up to you. What’s your advice for anyone reading who might want to follow a similar path to you?
Yeah, I mean, especially in this generation, I would say when it comes to dance—don’t get caught up in social media. I feel like everyone watches dance online now, especially on TikTok, and I feel like people think there’s this expectation that they have to showcase their dancing through social media, and posting good content, or whatever. But dance really isn’t about that. I would say it’s more about connecting with other people, and enjoying the music, and not putting any pressure on yourself. You don’t have to please anyone with your dancing. It’s more about the experience, and I think for anyone starting out, or anyone that’s about to go professional—just enjoy it, and do what you love.
