Tabanka Dance Ensemble delivers an unparalleled experience of expertly crafted, high-quality contemporary dance performances. These performances are deeply rooted in the rhythms, energy, culture, and interactive traditions of Africa and its Diaspora. At the heart of Tabanka's ethos is a unique blend of groundbreaking performances, nurturing artist development, education, and active engagement with communities and youth. This ensemble is globally renowned as the home of the Talawa Technique™, a distinguished and fully codified technique in African and Caribbean dance. Tabanka expertly weaves dance as a catalyst for social change.

Led by its professional dance troupe, Tabanka gives a powerful voice to the often-unheard narratives, providing platforms that celebrate, preserve, and elevate the artistic heritage of Black Nordic identity.

With an impressive outreach, the company has captivated over 786,000 audience members, consistently maintaining a 97% ticket sales rate and producing two major stage productions annually. Its youth initiatives have positively impacted an average of 16,000 teenagers and young adults each year. Furthermore, Tabanka's digital presence is formidable, with videos garnering over 16 million views on YouTube and a substantial following of 72,000 on Facebook.

Tabanka excels in crafting bespoke experiences for any setting, be it high art events, business gatherings, or community activities. With a firm belief that African and Caribbean dance should transcend societal boundaries, the ensemble demonstrates that dance is an art form without limits in application or value. Tabanka actively collaborates and consults with various organizations, contributing to their creative growth, health initiatives, and audience development strategies.

As a leading figure in the African Diaspora Dance scene in Europe and the Nordics, Tabanka is committed to elevating the field. It achieves this by sharing knowledge and practices, and advocating for fairness and representation within the European and Nordic art scenes, and society as a whole.

Talawa Technique is a fully codified and examinable technique for Africanistic kinaesthetic movement.

The Talawa Technique seamlessly merges ancestral movements, culturally contextualized vocabulary and contemporary movement sensibilities. It bridges the gap between “urban freestyling”, traditional and contemporary dance.  Thus offering a fused approach to stylized movement for stage and art production.

Talawa Technique uniquely combines rhythmic structures, a specialized approach to grounding, and traditional African Aesthetic movement qualities, such as: trembling, shaking, undulating and pulsating.

The Talawa Technique makes a clear distinction between aesthetical and technical choices. This allows the dancer to develop full ownership of their bodies natural bends and curves. The approach connects them to history and culture in an empowering way. Dancers are guided to skilfully master multiple isolations and polyrhythmic articulations, alongside the work of breaking down mental and cultural barriers, in order to free movement. The technique uses knowledge and culture as a liberating tool to create confident performers, who embrace their own identities, as well as the multiple identities of africanistic movement.

In Tabanka we aspire to draw heavily from the movement elements from danced rituals from Africa and the Caribbean. From deep within the body, the polyrhythm, the hip rotations, and the extreme contrasts of the rituals, vibrations will stem and blend into black bodies in danced rituals made to fit the specific context and diaspora in Norway and the West. Not without causing reactions, ranging from harmony to dissonance. The dancer´s flow, vibrations, transitions and breaks will nevertheless be felt and perceived through our many senses, also those that do not have had traditions to uphold them in the West.