Brian Footwork Green

Brian Green, professionally known as "Footwork," is a New York club-dance innovator, choreographer and educator whose rapid, rhythmically layered footwork helped carry house and hip-hop dance histories into international teaching and battle networks. He began dancing as a child with a broad studio foundation in tap, jazz, ballet, modern and African dance, studying with Phil Black and at the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and Joffrey Ballet. Between 1978 and 1980, his family and church community in Harlem exposed him to hustle, salsa, African forms, b-boying and electric boogie—his mother danced hustle and salsa while his older brother practiced b-boying and electric boogie. Green chose to pursue electric boogie and popping, and by 1983–84 he sought out New York's underground scene, understanding himself as participating in hip-hop and club culture by the end of 1984.

From 1984 to 1986, Green developed his practice in New York's freestyle and club venues including Roseland, 4Ds, Paradise Garage and the Tunnel. Dancers Damien and Mike offered early guidance in clubbing culture, followed in 1987 by Spanky and Story as major inspirations. These mentors, combined with his tap-informed rhythm and family influences, generated the rapid, detailed footwork that gave him his professional name. His signature layered small weight transfers, skates, directional changes and tap-like rhythmic subdivisions over a continuous club groove, creating a productive tension between ease and complexity.

Green's professional work spans performance and choreography with recording artists including Mariah Carey, Mýa, Missy Elliott, Salt-N-Pepa, Busta Rhymes, Barbara Tucker and Masters at Work. In 2001 he received an American Choreography Award for hip-hop choreography in Mýa's "Free." He has taught and judged internationally across the United States, Europe, Asia and Africa, serving as guest faculty at Peridance Center and Broadway Dance Center.

Beyond performance, Green created the House Dance Conference in 1999 alongside Ron Paisley, Dance Fusion and members of New York's club scene—an educational and competitive platform that frames club-dance vocabulary as history and technique to be transmitted with its community context. Through teaching, mentorship and event creation, Green has advocated for economic recognition of living street-dance creators and experienced teachers, ensuring that house and hip-hop dance are encountered as cultures rooted in named places, people and lineages rather than as anonymous steps.