Courtesy of Cheri Walker
Quinton with his mother, Krystal Bethea, and his colossal trophy after winning the Young Mr. Starpower award.
Quinton White Jr. of New Haven has not graduated elementary school yet. But he has won two national dancing championships, and he has no intention of stopping now.
The 9‑year-old phenom, whose family lives in New Haven’s Beaver Hills neighborhood, won Starpower Talent’s Young Mr. Starpower award at the Mohegan Sun Casino on July 13 and the American Dance Awards’ Young Mr. Dancer of the Year award in Orlando the next day. Both of the competitions featured contestants from across the country.
Quinton said he danced the same routine at both competitions.
Lia Davila, the owner of the Hamden Academy of Dance and Music, where Quinton practices said these were the first two titles for which Quinton competed.
Click here to watch a Facebook video of his winning performance.
Quinton’s Young Mr. Starpower Trophy is nearly twice his size. He was barely able to fit it through the door of his dance academy, where he sat down with the Independent to talk about his dancing.
Despite his slight stature, Quinton is nothing short of talent. He has mastered intricate routines and difficult moves, including handless frontflips and backflips and “acro’s,” a sort of backflip-to-handstand move, which he performed during the interview. He will have the opportunity to show off these moves and more at the historic Apollo Theater in New York, where he was offered a chance to dance in August.
Quinton’s grandmother Lily Bethea said Quinton started dancing at Christian Tabernacle Baptist Church in Hamden when he was 4 years old. Bethea said as Quinton got older, more and more people from the church told her that she should enroll him in dancing classes class.
“People kept saying, ‘This kid is talented, he needs to be in a school,’” Bethea said.
Jon Greenberg
Quinton with his two national championship trophies.
Bethea and Quinton’s mother, Krystal Bethea, signed Quinton up for dancing lessons at the Hamden Academy of Dance not long after. He has now been taking lessons at the academy for two years under the tutelage of dance instructor Tavon Dudley, who took an interest in Quinton “from day one,” according to Davila. Dudley choreographed the solo routine that Quinton performed in the two national competitions.
Quinton said he was very nervous before he went on stage at the competitions.
“Before I got on stage, I kept thinking I was going to mess up, ” he said. “But when I got on stage, I felt comfortable.”
Quinton said he wants to be a professional dancer when he grows up. He added that he mostly does contemporary dance now, but did liturgical dance at his church and has dabbled in other types of dance too.
Davila said the Hamden Academy of Dance and Music was founded 15 years ago but that she only began enrolling her students in competitions three years ago. She said she currently has about 130 students, mostly from New Haven and Hamden, who range in age from three to 18 years.
“This is a very unique school … we’re like a family,” Davila said.
She said she seeks for the school to not only be a place to learn dance, but also, more broadly, to be a place where students feel like they belong and are doing something positive.
Wow. He's really good. Quinton should sign up New Haven Ballet. Next stop, Julliard!