I am very excited to announce that I will be teaching at a new location in San Mateo starting Tuesday, May 3rd! All the details are on the flyer below. This is an absolutely gorgeous big, bright, airy studio with plenty of free parking. Please help me spread the word if you know anyone who might be interested. I also have paper copies of the flyer if you would like one or more to display or share. Thank you so much for your help!
Wednesday Inspiration: Souheir Zaki
A classic clip today from one of my favorite dancers. I think she is everyone's favorite, isn't she?
Egyptian Dancer Souher Zaki
This is just a short one, but I love it. Beautiful costume, wonderful musicality and her characteristic sweetness all in one quick clip: Enjoy!
And... normally I don't post on Thursdays but I do have an exciting announcement tomorrow about a new class starting soon. Please check back tomorrow for all the details!
Aida Nour with Shamadan
Egyptian Dancer Aida Nour
Aida Nour is one of my favorite dancers. I love her style of dancing and I was looking for more information about her life. I came across this article on the Gilded Serpent, which looks like it is about 10 years old.
The article discusses her early life and career and then has some wonderful quotes about dance that I wanted to share here. One of the things I especially loved was her thoughts on improvising and responding out of love for the music.
“If a dancer has very good technique and a good ear for the music she should just dance. -Aida Nour”
She goes onto say that the dance is about femininity, and since each dancer has her own feeling, each woman's dance will be unique. I thought her words from ten years ago were so important to repeat, because as we see an increasing shift to emphasize exacting drills and choreography, we lose this important connection to the dance: feeling and individual response to the music.
In another lovely comment, Aida Nour says that women all over the world can have a feeling for the dance and dance well, meaning that it is more about a woman's individuality than it is about nationality.
“Egyptian dance gives women femininity... each dancer has her own individual style. - Aida Nour”
I hope that new and continuing dancers will find inspiration in these words from one of the greatest Egyptian belly dancers of her generation. I certainly do!
Here are some beautiful vintage clips of Aida Nour.
Aida Nour in 1988 Part One
Aida Nour in 1988 Part Two
Here are some more modern clips, of Aida Nour with a shamadan. These two are among my absolute favorites, I just love her dancing so much.
Aida Nour with Shamadan Part One
Aida Nour Part Two
I hope you enjoyed those as much as I did. Happy dancing!!
Alisa
Wednesday Inspiration: Fifi Abdou
One of my all time favorite clips today. I love this song, and I love the way she dances to it, what more can I say?? I hope you enjoy it!
Fifi Abdou - Lessa Fakir
Scene from the Egyptian Film El Farha (The Wedding)
Mahraganat and Knife Dancing
Last week in class we talked a little bit about the Mahraganat style of music and knife dancing. I am not an expert on this subject, what I know about it comes from one of my own teachers, Amina, and the clips that I have seen. I love learning about it though so I thought I would pass some examples along for anyone who was in class.
One student asked if it was men who did the knife dancing, and based on the clips I have seen, it is (except of course when belly dancers are doing it as performance). This clip, which as an appeal for funding for a documentary project, gives a really good, quick explanation and shows examples of the dancing.
Mahragan: The Story of Egypt's Street Dance
This scene from the Egyptian film El Farha shows a man doing knife dance to a more shaabi-style song by Abdel Basset Hammouda. I love this song.
It's less fancy, but I also really like this clip of an Egyptian man dancing here:
Getting back to the music style of Mahraganat, this article gives a nice overview. Though I will just write here that I have seen many different and sometimes opposing things written about it in different places. I guess the lesson is as always to keep observing and to keep trying to understand the subtleties :)
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I hope that everyone's week is off to a great start!!
Happy Dancing
xo Alisa