Hip-hop is good. Hip-hop is good! Ok fine, it can be. Mike Prosserman, founder of the York University’s Chapter of Leave Out ViolencE (LOVE) is proof you can still have faith in the good of hip-hop. This Friday, March 9th, Mike will be hosting Breakin’ the Cycle II, an event at York University’s Underground that boasts impressive performances including break dancers, rappers, graffiti writers, beat-boxers and spoken word artists. For the second year, the event has completely sold out in advance. All proceeds go to an outreach program directed to high school and university students preventing violence through the influence of hip-hop.

“There’s too many people who see hip-hop in a negative light. We want to show it in a positive way. The only way to deal with violence is to directly deal with those who are affected by it.”

In the bboy world, Mike is known as Piecez, who started breakdancing at the age of 13 from breakdancing.com‘s descriptive posts from other members of the original website.

“I started breaking when I was just turning 13 years old. I loved it right from the start and couldn’t stop practicing. Sadly, like many at the time, I had no one to practice with so I turned to the closest alternative.”

Through the breakingdancing.com, Piecez discovered Bag of Trix who offered dance lessons and workshops taught by Benzo, influencing Piecez to take his new passion further.

“After taking Benzo’s class for several years I was inspired to take this to the next level and start competing.”

Making the decision to compete, he caught the attention of many already distinguished bboys including Bigglez who recruited Piecez into the Maximum Efficiency Crew (MEC). Other than school and bboying, Piecez keeps himself busy with charity work, DJing, event planning and the management of Funk Fanatics.

If you missed out on tickets for this year’s Breakin’ the Cycle, make sure you email Piecez to add you to the list for upcoming events at leaveoutviolence@hotmail.com.