MANILA, Philippines — Over the weekend, independent record label Careless Music, founded by James Reid, shared news of their newest signed artist group, A-Team. A-Team is a premiere street dance group composed of the Philippines’ best dancers in this current generation, and the creative union is an impressive coalescence of genius operating the two art forms, with music as its unifying factor.
Angelica Arda, who co-founded A-Team with her brother, MJ Arda, shared how their group started out, “my brother and I were coaching high school teams, aside from competing in the collegiate level. We spent most of our training just having fun to be honest, then when we started competing internationally and we kept winning. That’s when things changed to how A-Team is now.”
In addition to that, Arda said that she and her brother would often travel overseas to attend dance camps, learning from international choreographers to further improve their craft and passing what they’ve learned to their team. With their leadership, A-Team was crowned the Megacrew Division winner of the 2014 World Hip-Hop Dance Championship—they were the first-ever Filipino team to bring home the gold in that division.
The team’s eclectic use of different street dance styles brings out an air of theatricality in their choreography. Their fluid yet explosive movements are magnified even more by their pinpoint synchronization and exceptional layering of various dance elements. The A-Team is the premiere dance group in the Philippines.
Careless Music is excited to be getting into the world of dance with A-Team as the label believes that dancers deserve to receive the same recognition that music artists are getting. Careless Music CEO, Jeffery Oh, states “[Careless Music] would like to promote dance as a stand-alone performance art and get the recognition that it deserves.”
Angelica Arda shared that Careless Music made them feel that they can trust the label to uplift dance and take it to a whole other level. In addition to that, she also told us the reason that lead them to sign under the label- “Overall, it’s really just the positive energy and love that we were fortunate enough to share with Careless, through working on a few projects, that drew us in and ultimately led us to sign with them.”
She also expressed her excitement during the private Trade Launch of Careless stating “the group is excited to elevate dance in its truest form in the community and industry with Careless.”
In May 8, 2021, the signing of the 20 members of A-Team under Careless’ Management happened privately in Makati City. The members that are signed under Careless are:
- MJ Arda
- Angelica Arda
- Angel Datanagan
- April Tamon
- Chael Ablaza
- Joshua Decena
- Dean Gales
- Jaja Bordado
- Edd Vicente
- Jana Mahusay
- Ken Caliwara
- King Mistica
- Mae Mae Gomez
- Nica Santos
- Nico Angeles
- Roco Sanchez
- Ysai Castro
- Nadja Concepcion
- Freyja Kapangyarihan
- Aennon Tabungar
As Careless Music and A-Team share, exchange ideas and work together, both the label and the group hope that the dance community will continue to flourish in the Philippines and enter the dance scene internationally.
Catch A-Team’s performance at the Careless Music trade launch last March:
Follow A-Team’s social media pages for more updates and announcements: Instagram: @ateamph YouTube: ATeamPH