Dazzling dancer Ansuya is offering online classes in belly dancing. She has a free sample class which I saw part of. It’s a basics class. I didn’t manage to sit through the whole thing though.
If you end up enjoying this class and getting something useful out of it, you can opt to see the paid classes, which will change every week. The big problem is it will cost you $12.85. Now that’s no joke! I can’t figure out why this is expected to be an alternative to some wonderful DVDs you get for $14. And you get to keep those DVDs for good. Nor do I see it as an alternative to live classes because you don’t get instructor feedback. So why price them so high?
A while ago, dancer Layla Najwa offered online classes. I don’t remember what they cost and don’t know if she’s still doing these, but I think it was about $29 for a custom-made video. She would talk with you, figure out what you want to learn, and make a video just for you. I saw one of these and it did have useful, unique content. She also offered phone support, though I’m not sure if she was able to continue with that. The video quality wasn’t that great, but it was feasible.
This is a tough model to get right.
I saw the sample class partly, too, and decided to look at it again some time soon.
I did not know about the costs and must say I do not agree with them.
A bellydance class in NYC Broadway Dance Centre, which is a centre I randomly tried, and I guess not a cheap one, cost 17$ if you bought them in single classes.
I bet the 10 class package will be around the price Ansuya wants to charge for her online class.
I must say I found it not worth the try when there were download versions of WDBY downloadable to only one computer and not to be burned to dvds that cost almost as much as the actual dvds. I pictured I d rather add the shipment costs and have a disc I can carry with me and watch on any TV set or on any computer for almost the same price.
(which is great), the price is too high for the fact I do not get a dvd from it.
Same here, why would I pay as much as I pay for a regular live class at the highest for having an online class with no personal advice?
If you see it as additional dvd material and as an opportunity to learn from ansuya on a more regular basis without having to move to florida
Even if it stays online, it firstly depends on my download volume how often I may want to work with it, secondly on the speed of one s connection if it s a pain or not, thirdly it might still be removed after some months for administrative or other reasons.
I think producers have to learn if ppl pay the price for which they can have dvds in their property, you need to give them dvds even if something s broadcast online. or charge substanitally less.
WDNY recently changed the download system I believe to burnable versions.
So I guess more ppl felt the way I do about this option.
Make it cheaper or let us have something real in our hands (something round!)
In good news, I finally got my copy of Jenna’s next level. I love it! I actually like the fact that the flows are so short, because that means I can do them in the morning before going to music school if I want to. And I just got my dvd player working with a nice big tv, so I don’t have to haul my laptop to my living room if I want to do my videos.
I did my last class of the year tonight. My ability to squeeze my glutes is improving and I even managed to hold a basic shimmy for a couple of minutes. We did a complete choreography.
Wow Sajia, what choreography did you do? Whats it like?
You must tell me if you find those drill flows easy. They’re certainly different from others’ drills.
Now that you’ve done a whole choreography, what do you think of the difficulty level of the Celebration of Rhythm choreo?
wow, sajia, how did you get so much better so fast?
what is your experience with shimmying, what made you improve?
thanks
i had a look at the ansuya online classes today
the free on is quite interesting, not a beginners class and i liked the first combination
i don’t think i’ll be paying for any tho, it’s not just the fact that my broadband is slow and i won’t get an actual dvd but i noticed that when you pay you only get to go to the url and view the lesson once, once you leave that page you can’t view it again!!! that might be ok for people who leave their pc’s on 24/7 so can leave that window open forever just incase they want to view it again but i like to turn everything off overnight
Oh really? I must watch the rest of it! I only saw snake arms and some rib cage isolations — if there are combos, I totally must look. You can download it with Download Helper (Firefox add-in) apparently.
I was able to download it, only the part until my connection disconnected (which it often does) though, about 26 min.
yes there are combos and i did not find them easy, just watching them.
i think you might have fun
whhhaaaaaat – go to the link only once??? *shakeshead* that s really not worth the price, i thought the link would at least work unlimited times.
that s MEAN you pay like for an actual live class, but no one watches or corrects you! it s too much.
We did a simple choreography of the teacher’s devising to a Turkish pop song. I haven’t looked at the choreographies in Next Level, so I can’t say how they compare. I’ve only looked at the flows, I’ve only done the warm-up so far.
My improvement: well, I’ve been practicing more often – although not really in the last week or so, because I’ve been exhausted with school. I finally managed to do Blanca’s flow, and her shimmy section was useful in helping me keep shimmying for a set period of time. I’ve been doing glute squeezes every day for a couple of minutes each waking hour almost, just to get an idea of what and where the muscles are.
There’s this amazing tribal fusion dancer named Martina – look up “Martina bellyfringe” on Youtube – very jazzy, very modernist. I’m hoping to take classes with her next term – I used to do yoga with one of her best students, Angelina – you should check her out on youtube too. Because I am broke and going to music school AND working on a novel, I can only take one kathak class and one more tribal fusion class – the owner of the dance studio I go to says that for feedback one should take two bellydance classes a week.
However do you manage to do so many things, Sajia! Sing and write songs, dance, go for music classes, study – and now write a novel. Amazing. Give me two things to do and I freak out somewhat. In fact, very long ago I gave up Indian classical singing just because it was taking up so much of my mental space, I couldn’t cope with studies at college well enough.
Lucky you, doing classes with Martina. I did look her up. When will this be?
Well,often I do get stressed out from trying to do so much at once. But I find that my bellydance classes and some of the bellydance dvds act to relieve my stress, and I’ve been working on my novel only to blow off steam.
I’ll be doing classes with Martina in January, assuming the first class I do with her works out – I might have to do some more raqs sharqi before she accepts me, because she prefers students to have a good grounding in raqs sharqi.
I did more of Jenna’s Next Level on Friday. I find the flows fast-paced but doable. The trickiest part are the undulations and ab locks. I think I’ll be able to do all the turns by next Saturday – hey, I only have one exam left.
Linda, I finally managed to download the whole Ansuya class — and would you believe, I have no clue where it went to on my computer nor what it was called! That is supremely funny. I don’t see it in the program’s folders, nor on the desktop and not in My Documents or my Temp folder. Well, let’s see if I bump into it sometime. It doesn’t seem to be letting me download it now. Actually she should let people download them – it’s only fair. What happens if you can’t get through the class first time? You get to it again and let your internet connection struggle through the process all over again?
But I did see a bit of it and yes, it has these combinaitons. They looked average-like. The quality of the video, the sound, etc was really good. Have you explored her website and seen what others say? Also where to figure out what the week’s class has?
Sajia, I don’ t find Jenna’s warm up or drills easy! I found the choreography easy enough, but definitely not the hip layering. Not that I’ve tried it enough though. I have this habit of going straight to a choreography and tackling that. I did the same with Blanca’s choreography. Luckily Blanca said that was looking very very pretty. But I’m not sure she’d have said the same for the flow, if I’d done it.
Mala, I finally took a look at Ansuya’s site. As fresh as the concept is, I find it pretty outrageous to charge $13 and not let people at least log in multiple times. One person on tribe mentioned that after using PayPal to pay for the week’s lesson, she mistakenly waited for the email acknowledging payment to go to the website again. She was supposed to hit the ‘back’ button….. to make a long story short, she wound up paying for the lesson twice. And that’s under an hour, that she can still only watch as long as her computer stays logged in.
I wonder if anybody can tell me why Ansuya’s snake arms look so strange in this clip. It’s almost as though she’s hunching her shoulders forward every time she begins doing snake arms. Is this a tribal thing, or an Ansuya thing?