bellydance – Page 3 – a t i s h e h

Review of Masters of Bellydance Music

Dear readers, this is my very first CD review, so I decided to make it easy on myself.

Masters of Bellydance Music is a ridiculously good, one-great-song-after-another, endlessly listenable album.

See? That was easy.

Okay, I guess you probably want to hear a little more. Masters of Bellydance Music is a compilation of fourteen tracks with a predominantly Egyptian, raqs sharki focus. The collection includes classics such as Tamr Henna, Aziza, and Enta Omri. It also brings in some folk flavour with songs like Souher Zaki Fi Balady and Fatme Serhan’s Ala Warag Il Foull on the balady end of things, and Saidi Party and Afrah Al Said for when you want to get your cane out.

What really gets me about this album is the quality of the recordings. The music is played with real instruments, and the sound is so clear and crisp that you can hear every single note and trill. Everything sounds like it was recorded yesterday, and ready for your performance tomorrow.

Most important though is the richness of the music. I have had my copy of Masters of Bellydance Music since 2007, and have listened to it many times. Most of the time I listened to it passively, waiting for a bus or dancing around my apartment — it’s impossible to hear these songs without wanting to move. But when I’ve also listened more actively I noticed that so many of the songs are interesting. They are the exact opposite of one-rhythm pop music, and they do not get old no matter how many times I listen to them.

The only thing that’s difficult about picking an album I like this much to do my first review is that I have a hard time picking my favourite tracks. Layali Al Sharq is up there, as is the album opener Rakasni Ya Habibi. Raks El Sheik grows on me more and more as I listen to it. But there’s not a single one I’d want to skip! Instead, I’m looking up the artists to find out what else I can get by them.

You can get Masters of Bellydance Music at Amazon, or direct from the producer at Hollywood Music Center.

(Full disclosure: I thought this was a review copy as I was writing this review, and kept thinking, “yes, this is a review copy, but I would have been glad to spend the money.” Then I saw on Amazon that I bought the CD myself, ages ago. And yeah, it was money well spent.)

Review of Galit Mersand’s Bellylicious

Humour and bellydance don’t often seem to mix. I don’t quite see the reason why. We bellydancers use as many false eyelashes as drag queens, and easily beat them on glitter and sequins. So why don’t we have their talent for not taking things too seriously?

These probably sound like fighting words. In fact, I appreciate how much effort it takes to help the general public understand that oriental dance isn’t just shaking booty. But I think it’s ironic that a dance with so much lightness and flirtatiousness — and joy! — should be talked about in such serious terms.

Galit Mersand performing shisha dance, bellydance, with melaya leff costume

Galit doing her shisha dance

Enter Galit Mersand. And Bellylicious, a one-hour cabaret show that combines stand-up, dance, and, once everyone’s warmed up nice and good, a bit of cultural background about the dance itself. Galit wrote the show to explain oriental dance to the general public, but to her credit, it doesn’t feel particularly teacherly. Well, until she dances raqs al assaya as a disciplining headmistress. Did I mention Galit is in the U.K.? Some parts of her show, you really need a public school education to understand.

This gives you a clue that the show, in the tradition of cabaret, doesn’t shy away from playing with the sexy, cheeky side of the dance. Galit starts out by describing herself as a “serial flirt,” and bellydance is, of course, the perfect artistic outlet for someone who likes to tease. Now, it just so happens that I come from a very, how shall I put it, flirtation-rich culture. It may be the case that I can go on for hours about how underflirty and misflirtatious North American society can be. (Don’t get me started on Germany…) I am so happy to have someone acknowledge that this is a big part of the dance.

Watching a full show of bellydance might be a test of patience for the non-initiated. However, the dances themselves are not just plopped into the dialogue. In fact, they continue the themes of Galit’s jokes in a kind of bellydance-standup fusion. (It reminds me quite a bit of Cihangir Gümüstürkmen‘s work.) They are therefore all a bit experimental, and some work better than others. I could have done without the transformation of yoga positions into bellydance moves that starts the show off. But the “headmistress with stick” shtick was wonderful, and the drum solo that ends the show — mostly straight dancing, but with small comic bits that nevertheless fit the music perfectly — was a stroke of brilliance. And anyone who’s tired of “overacted” dancing, the kind with way too many gestures and literal interpretation of a song nobody present understands, will enjoy Galit’s sendup.

Galit Mersand bellydancing with stick, cane

The thing that’s necessary for the comedy to work, the one element without which it would all flop, is dancing so good that even an audience member utterly new to oriental dance would be able to recognise as excellent. If a dancer made jokes about bellydancing and then performed with anything less than professional polish, the whole show would be an exercise in diminishing the art.

And Galit’s dancing is excellent. Really, really excellent. She combines varied and precise technique with incredible lightness: everything looks easy and floaty and fun. I have seen so many technically brilliant dancers lately who make it look like hard work, and there’s something about that that’s exhausting to watch. But some dancers — Ranya Renee and Maria Sokolova come to mind — give you the sense that they’re having the time of their lives, and in doing so allow you to take pleasure in the music and movement too. And Galit is one of them.

It also makes you want to learn. While watching Bellylicious, one part of my brain was enjoying the dancing, and the other was thinking, “Oh, that’s a cool combination! Oh, that’s another one! I should look these up again. Oh, what a nice way of combining those moves!” Of course, Galit has instructional videos too (and I will be reviewing one of them), but I also expect I’ll turn back to Bellylicious for inspiration on movements, combinations, and general styling.

I received a review digital copy of Bellylicious from Galit — she sells her videos both on DVD and as downloads at galitmersand.com. (At the time of this writing, the latter are quite affordable, even once you convert from British Pound to whatever currency you’re playing with.) The video is spliced together from different shows she did, and sometimes the splices do show. Film quality is a little fuzzy, though you can see everything, especially when it comes to the dancing. And usefully, the credits include all the songs she used.

IAMED essay contest for the near-win!

Dear readers, I thought I’d share a little something with you. I just got word that my entry to IAMED’s 2013 essay contest won second place. Woo hoo! I’m especially delighted by the generous prize of four DVDs, which I have been having a lot of fun choosing.

The prompt asked us to describe our favourite part of the bellydance routine, and I wrote about the drum solo:

This is how I started to fall for the drum solo. It can be fierce and tight, full of pops and locks, but it can also be cool and relaxed, with travel moves and big shimmies. And it’s the perfect do-it-yourself version of bellydance. You don’t need to have a lot of space for traveling moves, or the right floor for spins, or ceilings high enough to practice the veil. I can listen to a drum solo while waiting for the bus, and play with the rhythms under my winter coat. And even more exciting, you don’t need a full orchestra to enjoy dancing to live music. Find one drummer who is really into it, even if he or she hasn’t mastered all of Arabic or Turkish percussion, and you can have music and dance to it.

You can read the entire essay online here.

Review of Ruby Beh’s Pilates for Bellydancers

I’ve been traveling lately, and it hasn’t left much time for dance, or for any kind of working out. It’s pretty terrible, going from pretty regular movement to nothing. So tonight, after I put the kiddo to bed, I decided to try out Ruby Beh‘s newish instructional on RAQStv, Pilates for Belly Dancers. I wanted to dance, but even more, I wanted to give my abs a little attention.

What I found is an answer to a lot of my dance problems of the past year. One of my challenges lately has been moving from the idea that bellydance is totally “loose” (I’m not really sure where I got this, except by some dumb opposition to ballet), and building up abdominal strength, learning how to keep my core engaged, and hardest of all, learning how to breathe with all of this. I don’t think there’s a single dance class I attend where the teacher is not constantly on me to keep my core “zipped up.”

Well, that’s what Pilates for Belly Dancers is all about. Ruby starts out slowly, really slowly, with posture and practice breathing both standing up and lying down. I loved the meticulous tiny movements that at least started giving me a sense of how the breathing and muscular contractions should feel. She then guides you through some classic pilates movements (the hundred, roll-ups, etc.) but interweaves exercises that help you gain control of the specific muscles useful for bellydance.

After a workout that is challenging if done attentively, Ruby has you practice some basic bellydance moves with special attention to the core. Finally, she teaches a short combination. In both of these segments, she explains what effects can be achieved with a strong, controlled pilates foundation — the fast spin that can stop on a dime, the quick-changing footwork that doesn’t make you bob up and down.

The video is 1 hour and ten minutes long. There was a brief but satisfying stretch to cool down with in the bonus content material, which also included the pilates section from Ruby’s Flawless Floorwork: The Lost Art of Belly Dance Floorwork DVD. The filming is clear throughout, though there is one blooper that was not edited out and a few camera cuts are confusing. Think filmed class, not pro DVD. Still, I had no problems following along.

In short, I was thrilled with the program. Ruby’s generous with pointers on form, and she will sometimes give modifications. She has the experienced instructor’s ability to know, magically, through the screen, just what I’m doing wrong and to correct it. She also has a knack for coming up with lots of illustrative similes to help conceptualize a movement.

All in all, it was so good for me to spend an hour really paying attention to what my core was doing at all times, how all other movements, whether exercise or dance, related to it and drew on its strength. Like Ranya Renee, Ruby talks about engaging the kegels too, though I haven’t heard this talked about in my classes. I haven’t been as delightfully concentrated during a pilates program in a long time. I wish I could buy this on DVD, but at least it’s being offered as a two-month rental on RAQStv.

Veil and Drum Solo Workshops with Aisa Lafour, and other dance notes

My dear readers, I’ve been a busy dancer. I had an incredibly intense week about a month ago — lots of work, lots of kid, lots of dancing in the evenings, either in class or with a video or doing improv, and then on top of that, a super Saturday of workshops with Cihangir Gümüstürkmen. (I will write about this soon.)

Then I was tired. Just exhausted. I didn’t want to dance anymore, I took about a week and a half off. You know the feeling — not inspired, not motivated? I really just wanted to go home in the evenings and spend time with my family, and not be in the studio. I also felt a little sick. I thought, what’s wrong with going to bed ridiculously early for a while? (Answer: nothing. Nothing at all.)

I read my emails from Alia Thabit and Rosa Noreen, and felt guilty for not doing my improv or my Delicious Pauses homework.

I watched a bit of a few videos. Ranya Renee’s Baladi DVDs, and Autumn Ward’s Beautiful Technique. Listened to baladi songs while going about my business, and practiced taking apart the music. Realised that I have a ton of music, but not enough baladi. One night after work I wrote a little piece for the RAQStv essay contest. The prompt was to write about our practice, about how we fit dance into our lives. I wrote about how I try, but so, so often fail.

But you know what? Sometimes taking a break is good. I actually felt re-energized when I went back to classes. A few things clicked that I had been struggling with before. I won the RAQStv contest. And this past Saturday, I took part in two workshops with Aisa Lafour sponsored by Hayal Oriental Moves.

The first workshop was veil technique for beginners, along with a choreo to the gorgeous song “Yearning” by Raul Ferrando. I have very little experience of veil in class (or, well, anywhere else), so I was glad for the opportunity to do a workshop on veil that assumed nothing. Aisa had us start at the very beginning, walking back and forth with the veil, watching how it moves, and learning how to arc it up above us to get it behind or in front. Then we moved on to technique for a few traveling moves, and the rest of the technique was done in the course of the choreo. What I particularly appreciated — and want to remember — are the little performance details Aisa put in. Things like moving softly down as the veil falls, so as to mimic the veil’s movement with one’s own body. I adore these kinds of details, the refinements that make dance really beautiful and more than just a bunch of movements.

While this was all going on, I had Realization of the Day #1: bellydance, oriental dance, however you want to call it, is so ridiculously complex, involves so much training, attention to the tiniest muscle movements, practice with props, learning music, and yet most of the general public thinks it’s nothing more than hoochy mama butt grinding.

And then my veil got caught on one of the ceiling lamps.

The second workshop was a drum solo to “Drum On” by Ali Darwish. This was a really peppy, fun routine, with a number of different shimmies, some fast spins and travel accents, and a few cute Latin elements. I particularly enjoyed a funny butt shimmy Aisa described as coming from Brazilian dance, and which she called the “rabbit.”

It was above my level, but I love having a sense of what I might learn, review, try again work on. Here in Berlin, a lot of workshops are pretty explicitly geared to levels, which I’m not as used to from the US. There, people just went to workshops. On the one hand, it makes sense, since instructors can teach advanced material to advanced dancers. But I also think there’s a lot to be gained from doing workshops a bit above one’s level, since they give you an understanding of where you have to push yourself to get to.

Then I had Realization of the Day #2. Readers of this blog know I’m not a huge fan of learning choreos. I’m a slow learner, and I often get frustrated trying to remember and keep up with everyone else. But I realised on Saturday that learning choreos is not just about a certain approach to dance, or even about learning transitions. It’s also that certain moves are just not so likely to pop up in drilling or technique lessons, but somehow do make their way into choreo instruction. These might be transitions, or traveling steps, or stylizations, or they just might be somewhat lesser-used moves that the “home” instructor hasn’t covered yet.

Anyway, the point was, for once I found myself really enjoying the process of learning a choreo. Some parts of the song really clicked for me, others I had a lot of trouble with (and believe me, I know those are precisely the ones I need to practice!). But all in all, there were just a lot of really delicious movement combinations that were fun to do. And the more we rehearsed them, the sweatier we got, and the looser the muscles did too, so some of the passages also became easier to perform.

When we were working on a particularly tricky bit, Aisa mentioned that she’d had a hard time at first with the combo, and had to practice to get it. This kind of thing is so good to hear when you’re struggling to pick up a phrase. She then talked about how she often choreographs above her dance level, so as to challenge herself. I thought this was also a wonderful reason and way to do choreography. If improv is about finding your safety moves and working with them, why not choreograph to bring more moves into that repertoire?

So now, some classes, workshops, DVDs, and writing later, I am once again a happy dancer. And I know precisely what I need to work on.

And sometimes the universe tells you to dance

I try not to be too, too superstitious, but every now and then, the universe organizes its messages a little too neatly. Everywhere I turn I hear the same thing, and finally I start to think that maybe I should pay attention. Take breathing. Suddenly, everyone’s telling me to breathe! Alia Thabit, who tells me to prep for the 90 Day Dance Party by breathing in time to the music. Or I do Hala Khouri’s yoga DVD, and am struck by how much the breathing helps me unwind. Or my real life teachers are suddenly focusing much more on working with breath to create movement. Or I get an email from Rosa Noreen’s Delicious Pauses Online Intensive, and she’s going on about…. well, you can guess.

Okay, so I’ve figured out I should take a breath now and then. Maybe even when I’m moving. But another little synchronicity got my attention lately too. First, it came my way from Life is Cake, in the form of a video in which several dancers talk about the evolution of their style. What really hit me was Autumn Ward’s contribution, which you can see here.

Autumn talks about a period in her life when she worked on a number of skills she thought would impress a nightclub crowd, and how she wound up returning to her own passion for intricate, lyrical dance. I thought it was so honest and vulnerable for her to talk about moments gone wrong (or at least awry) in her artistic path, and also so inspiring. It’s so easy when doing creative work to get caught up in what we can’t do, what other people can, and so on. And often that can be positive — as Autumn points out, it can lead to acquiring new skills. But sometimes it’s also key to remember where your passion is, what your strength is, what’s authentic to yourself. And really, that’s where the greater part of the effort needs to go.

Then Alia posted a quote from Seth Godin on her Facebook wall:

The ability to say, “It’s not for you,” is the foundation for creating something brave and important. You can’t do your best work if you’re always trying to touch the untouchable, or entertain those that refuse to be entertained.

“It’s not for you.”

This is easy to say and incredibly difficult to do. You don’t have much choice, though, not if you want your work to matter.

Now, that’s pretty great stuff right there. I have no idea who this Seth Godin fellow is, but I’d buy him a cup of coffee if I saw him just because of that one blog post. What a wonderful line to keep in mind, not just for the living critics, but the imaginary critics who populate my head? “This is not for you, babe. Move on, there’s nothing to see here.”

Anyway, long story short, I put one and one together and figured the universe was telling me the following: first, however frustrated I sometimes get with myself in my dance classes, with the fact that I’m not further along than I really am, I needed to chill out, and also realise that at some point I’ll have to figure out what kind of dancing I most want to do, even if my skills and technique still have a lot of developing to do. And second, in my real life work, which is also creative, I needed to care a lot less about what people might think if I were to carry it out precisely as I want to. And that latter bit was much more important. Because in way, the dance world was telling me what I had to do at work.

The result? This week I finished an important chunk of a long project, and in fact, the hardest section so far — one I’ve been fighting with for more than a year. I rewarded myself by going to the wonderful local bellydance store, Saidi, and buying my first bedlah. It’s turquoise, so much louder and more revealing than what I went in looking for, and just unapologetically glittery. I’m a big believer in spending money on instruction and not on costuming, but in this case, I had earned it.

And my dance classes were filled with all sorts of little moments of joy. First, in ballet, having our teacher ask us to do a flat back, and actually getting it right. I have struggled with the flat back for ages, so having her come by, take a look at me, and say “it’s perfect” was like finishing a long hike. Or noticing that some of the armwork I did in the Aziza DVD was seeping its way into my bellydance class work. Or today, practicing those killer Soheir Zaki hips at home and finding that it actually made a difference when we drilled them.

Hmmmm…. I hear you wondering. Is there a moral to this long, rambling post? Basically:

1. Do what your passion tells you to do.
2. Enjoy small victories.
3. Try breathing once in a while.

Review of Aziza’s Hands, Arms & Poses

Aziza’s oft-repeated wisdom is: “Be amazed.”

At one point while I was doing this video, I thought: “Dude, if I found my body doing what hers is doing, in the way that hers is doing it, I sure would be amazed!”

When you see the title of the DVD, namely Hands, Arms & Poses, you can be forgiven for thinking this video will give you ideas for things to do with your hands and arms while you dance. And it does. Aziza covers useful stretches for the hands, does drills to isolate your wrists, teaches lotus hands as well as beautiful positioning of the fingers. And while the arm work centers on the port de bras, there are good tips for moving with intention, and other arm pathways as well.

That said, I kept thinking the video (which I received as a review copy) should have been called something else. Because the real strength of this program is not in giving you a thousand hand or arm positions — it doesn’t — but in teaching coordination and control. And for that, you have some really fine drills.

After a quite dancey warmup of eight minutes, focusing on the arms especially, you have a variety of exercises. The section called “Drills & Exercises” with “Drills.” This 17-minute segment is a great standalone mini practice companion, the bulk of it being slow and steady arm flows layered on top of rhythmic hip movements. This is the kind of thing that some instructors do have you practice early on (one of mine does), but not reliably, and it is challenging. When I did this section, I had to think that I should probably do it at least once a week. Seventeen minutes can’t be that hard, can it?

Aziza is looking to see if you’ve been doing your wrist isolations.

Next come two sections on foot patterns. In each, Aziza teaches a long combination, has you repeat it a few times in both directions, and then adds changing arm work to it. I’ve grown to love the teaching technique of drilling a combo with stylistic variations, and I think it’s a wonderful way to show what varying arms can do. The first combination is somewhat easier to get a handle on, while the second shows Aziza’s ballet training, and has rather more difficult leg work. Aziza doesn’t then explain every single arm moves, but you’re supposed to follow along and, probably, improvise a bit on your own.
The one thing that drove me absolutely nuts during this section is that once Aziza gets going with the arm stylizations, the camera focuses way too much on her lower body and feet. I found myself wanting to stick my hand through the screen and yank the view up to Aziza’s arms!

After some wrist isolations, we move on to the “Poses & Combinations” section. In a way, this is the hardest of all, though it looks the easiest if you’re just watching the video. There are three combinations of, well, poses, but the trick is that you’re supposed to move with incredible control from one to the next. Imagine a crazy hard tai chi. When I posted about doing Hands, Arms & Poses on Facebook, Lauren Zehara confirmed my suspicion that this is truly hard, but worthwhile, dance practice:

It’s very different from what most dancers study in their regular weekly classes. Aziza is assuming that we can do all the basics (hipwork, etc) and challenging us to do that while holding exquisite lines in the body and moving with grace and intention. THAT is challenging at any level, and great stuff to work on!

Why do this kind of work? I think if I’d run across this material a few years ago, I would have thought it pointless and boring. But in the meantime, I’ve worked with Rosa Noreen’s Delicious Pauses, and I took a workshop with Heather Wayman in which she shared some of Nadira Jamal’s tricks for using poses to structure improv. Both Rosa and Nadira are well aware of Aziza’s work, I know, but through them I was prepped to see the value of this. It is very hard to slow down the way Aziza practices here, and to keep looking good. I found myself naturally checking in on my abs, to see if they were pulled in, because I needed that muscular support to control my movements. And, while I wouldn’t do all of the poses, a lot of them were quite beautiful and pleasurable. It became, dare I say it, almost meditative to repeat them with intention.

After a brief, also dance-based cool down, you’re done. But you’re actually not done. Hands, Arms & Poses includes three performances. One incorporates the movements into an actual dance, another offers a dance with veil, and a third is “vintage Aziza” in a powerhouse performance from 1994. Other extras include photos of Aziza as a young ballet student and beginning bellydancer, and an interview.

Production values are very high. The quality of the film is extremely good, and the video itself is shot in Le Windsor, a nineteenth-century Montréal hotel. Aziza uses real music, from Hollywood Music Center, track information is given, and the music is in time to the exercises, not just a vague backdrop. The one thing I wasn’t fond of was the fascination with the feet in the foot patterns (!), but in other sections of the video the camera knew where to look. This is a gorgeous video, and one I will return to again.

You can get Hands, Arms & Poses at Amazon or via Aziza’s website.

Roundup: How (and why) to learn bellydance online for free – Updated

We all know (well, most of us) that the best way to learn to dance is with a live teacher. And there really is no substitute for someone who can guide you in person. But there are some good reasons to use video instruction, and the free dance resources I mention below are perfect for this kind of thing:

1. You want to review a move you learned in class.

2. You didn’t understand your teacher’s explanation, and want to see how another dancer introduces the movement or idea.

3. You want to drill movements, and you’d like some guidance as you do so.

4. You need some inspiration, something fresh to make dance exciting.

5. You don’t have a lot of time, and you just want to incorporate five or ten minutes of dance into your day, maybe even in the office!

6. You’re on the go, and want to watch someone teach a move on your phone or mobile device.

Now, there are some truly bad teachers offering their “services” for free online, and every now and then one of those videos makes the rounds. But the truth is that there is also some good instruction out there. None of these will replace live teaching, and in most cases the free stuff isn’t even as comprehensive as DVDs or longer structured instruction. They can, however, make a wonderful adjunct to your regular classes.

Totally Free, but High Quality Instruction Online

Tiazza Rose: Amazing, amazing, amazing treasure trove of videos. Not only does Tiazza go over many basic movements, but she also has videos featuring veil moves, cane, folkloric moves, about a million small combinations and some longer choreos.

Mahin’s Daily Bellydance Quickies: You have to sign up for the Daily Quickies email list. What you get is not basic instruction, but a potpourri of little daily hints, tips, and lessons in your inbox. One day it’ll be an email with ideas on how to keep your drilling fresh, another day it will be a stretch useful for dancers, and yet another day you’ll get a combination to do with a particular rhythm.

My Bellydance Workout: Coco of Berlin has a variety of basic movement lessons and really useful drills. Everything is filmed clearly in a bright studio.

Bellydance Boulevard: The website connected to this YouTube account is defunct, and I suspect the videos aren’t being updated anymore. But what’s there is really neat. First there is a series of videos on basic bellydance moves taught by a single instructor. Then follows a variety of focused mini-workshops by a variety of teachers around the world. You want Soheir Zaki hips? Here they are!

So, what about you? Have you used any of these programs? Is there a wonderful secret source of free online bellydance teaching I’ve missed?

Update:

Reader LadyDeyrdre adds a few more useful contributions, and in looking them up I am reminded (how could I forget?) that Neon also has a series of quickie bellydance move instruction videos on YouTube. So, the additions:

Anthea Kawakib: A short playlist of basic zill instruction on YouTube.

Neon: At latest count forty-two videos, going from basics to traveling moves.

Irina Akulenko: Also a pretty solid series of beginner instructional videos, with some good tips. These are on the Howcast website, but are also available on YouTube.

Review of Samra’s Shimmyrobics

There’s a bit of a story to this review. A long time ago, in a bookstore far, far away, I found a DVD in the discount section called Belly Dance – Total Workout For Body Shaping (don’t buy from this link, but do read the comments!) It was three bucks, it didn’t look too promising, but I am a bellydance DVD addict and can not let anything go by. There’s always something to be learned.

When I got home and popped it in, however, I realised that the woman in the video had nothing to do with the woman on the cover of the case. In fact, even weirder was the fact that the video itself was a rhythm instructional, not a workout at all!

Part of the situation is explained on the Amazon page by Samra herself. The video is basically a copy of her video “101 Shimmies Volume 2,” sold under a deceiving cover and title by an unethical distributor. It’s not a workout, and in fact her attention was for the video material to be combined with instruction from her other DVDs. Someone just using this will be rather surprised by the lack of any basic teaching of moves. What’s more, she doesn’t receive any royalties from sales of the video. From our correspondence, it seemed she was even more upset that a confusing, poorly-branded video was out under her name.

I thought part of what I could do is work with the actual videos, and see what they have to offer. Now, these are old school videos. Samra herself told me that the production company was a small town affair, and this is true. The editing, production, music cueing, is all far from glossy or smooth. But what is actually in the content?

I’ve worked with Shimmyrobics twice so far, and in two rather different ways. The first time, I did the video all the way through, albeit in pieces. It’s almost two hours of material, beginning with a one-hour instructional section. What follows is a short, but pretty thorough warmup, five workout combinations, a cool down, and an advanced workout which is the five combinations strung together. When I first worked with the video, I was a bit annoyed that the warmup came after the instruction, although the chaptering certainly allows you to click on the warmup first. However, the second time I did the video, I just did the workout, and in that case, it was easy just to click on warmup and stay with the program until the end.

The instructional section has a ton of material. Even though I’ve seen a lot of it taught in other places, there were some new moves or combinations of moves for me, and also certain moves where the description was particularly enlightening. I still have to work on my choo-choo shimmy, for example, but Samra’s explanation of it is one of the most helpful that I’ve found so far. She also includes some moves from her other dance influences, like a backwards African shimmy and an African stylization of the chest shimmy. (In fact, these were some of my favourites in the workout!) Samra’s descriptions are detailed, and often include pointers on safety. The full run-down:

Head: forward and back; side-circle tilt.
Shoulders: lifts and drops; rolls; thrusts; quiver and shimmy.
Ribcage: slide, shimmy, circle.
Abdomen: pops – in, out.
Knees: side, flex, moderately straight, circle.
Feet: point/flex, circle.
Hands: close/open, shimmy, palms up or down.
Hip slide shimmy
Muscle shimmy
Jello/Fellahi
Freezes and Vibration
Knee Shimmy
Walking Shimmy
Hip Patterns (various hip bumps, lifts, and drops)
Hip Circles
Hip Bumps
Walking Hip Lifts and Drops (the latter a little like the Soheir Zaki step)
Running Choo-Choo
African Choo-Choo
Omi Circle

The workout has five combinations. For each combo, Samra does the steps individually and drills them for a while, then strings them together and repeats them in four directions. Rinse, repeat. After the first teaching of a combo, on-screen text lists the moves. I liked some of the combinations more than others, but taken together, they really did get my heart rate up, and even gave me a bit of next-day burn!

Two things I wasn’t as excited about were the repetition of combos in the four directions, and the fact that the music accompanying the workout is just a basic rhythm, without a real connection to the moves. I later read on Samra’s website that the latter was intentional, and that she expects students to use the moves with their own music. Accordingly, the second time I did the workout, I had my trusty mp3 player ready with my iPod in. I started pausing the video between the combos, putting on some really danceable pop (Natacha Atlas, if you must know), and practiced the combos to the music. And I did not stick to the four cardinal directions. Instead, I took the moves from the combo, changed up the number of times, the order, and did the traveling moves in a variety of directions and floor shapes. It became really fun, and a chance for a bit of structured improvisation!

The verdict? If you want something really smoothly produced, this is not the video for you. However, there is so much info on it, that beginning dancers especially are likely to find something new or useful. And the workout really is a workout. If you’re willing to play with the video creatively to make it part of your own practice, you will enjoy it.

You can get Shimmyrobics at Samra’s website, www.samrasexpressions.com. (Don’t buy it from Amazon under the fake name!)

Refining the Dance with Maria Sokolova

This is the one hundredth post on Atisheh Dance! Here’s to a “century” of me futzing around my living room in yoga pants and a hip scarf and then writing about it for the internets!

Yesterday I wrote about putting together my own customized dance practice using Datura Online. However, since I’m not a fan of boundaries, I used Datura for the warmup, drills, and cool down, but got my dance in from RAQStv. And namely, from a video I was reeeeeally excited about, Maria Sokolova’s 15-minute lesson from Project Belly Dance.

Kick it!

I actually already worked with this video once while I was on holiday, albeit with minimal warmup, so this was my second time doing it. There is quite a bit of material crammed into this little instructional, so it’s the kind of thing that’s worth repeating — and thankfully, RAQStv has it for a month-long rental.

Maria starts by teaching a basic combination facing the camera, then with her back to the viewer. After repeating it for a bit, she starts to go through each section, showing how to add nuance, contrast, and expression to each movement. It might be a particular twist of the torso, a way of moving the arm through space, a lovely variation on a spin, or the quality of expression during a movement.

I adore Maria’s performance style, this is the video I hoped she would make, and I’m so glad she made it. (And I’m just hoping even more that this is exactly what she does for her eventual Cheeky Girls instructional video, but slower, and more.) I think that for anyone who wonders how to get from the basic moves you do in class to a gorgeous performance — sometimes soft and feminine, sometimes assertive and dramatic — this video shows some of the ways to modify movement.

The material is tricky to get on the first time through, which is why it really does bear repeating. The second time I worked with the video, I had already internalized more of the combo, so focusing on the “extras” became easier. And because it is a quick video — it was, after all, the challenge to make a 15-minute instructional — Maria presents some material faster than she probably would in a regular class, especially right at the end. I will definitely do this at least once or twice more so as to learn as much as possible before the rental expires!

My one beef with this video had to do with production: Maria is wearing a green costume, and her background is green curtains! When I projected this, the lack of contrast made it a bit difficult to see her. (It was easier the first time around, when I was working from a large computer screen.) I suspect this is just because Project Belly Dance was being filmed on a time crunch and in the available space, but I still would have preferred a white background.