Let’s face it, the holiday’s are not great for your routine. Between baking feasts for your family and cleaning the house for your in-laws, there isn’t much time left for you. Halloween starts off the season with late nights spent crafting costumes for the kids and it doesn’t stop there. Before you know it Thanksgiving…
The holidays are upon us, and that includes picking out fabulous gifts for friends and family. What gifts should you give the belly dancer on your nice (or naughty) list? Accessories or music would be my top picks. Stay away from actual costumes, bra/belt sets are better when planned and measured. Pricey props are also…
Dancing as a guest dancer with Wayward Tribal and now as a member is a new and invigorating process. While many purists (in either side of the cabaret/tribal fence) shout that their styles are so irreconcilably different that they can hardly share a stage, that just isn’t true. Both styles are dramatic interpretations of music,…
One of my favorite belly dance videos is Aziza of Montreal’s Practice Companion. As she states in the intro, the video was produced at the request of her many students and workshop participants. It follows a format of a typical Aziza class, with her at the head of the room facing her students leading them…
During the Essence Of Belly Dance workshop one of Mira Betz’s key focus points revolved around our body image, brain chemistry and being on stage. How primitive flight or fight responses can hinder a performance, the interaction between our brain and our body, and how we can use this to our advantage. Her opening remarks to the class reminded me of Aziza’s “if it doesn’t feel like this it doesn’t look like this” mantra. Where Aziza was focused on the muscles and posture of the dancer (because lets face it, it is far easier to slouch than sit up straight, and if it doesn’t feel like you are sitting up straight then you look like you are slouching), Mira was going moving toward the mind body connection of “when you look like this, you will feel like this.”
