::more than somewhat::

On Volume 3 of Belly by Sandra, we have a classic choreography set to an edited version of Faddah by Hossam Ramsy. The piece has varied rhythm and pace. The choreography really isn’t a beginner level one, which is why I felt it should not have followed as Volume 3 after the 1 and 2 set of belly dance basics. There are many movements such as the pivot turn and other footwork, not taken up on the two basic volumes, so why should there be a connection at all. I nitpick about names and volumes only because later down the line, this does influence buying decisions. For those who know it’s coming and are waiting eagerly, the names don’t matter a bit.

The instruction also moves along at a good pace, which may be a tiny bit too fast for the absolute beginner.  Of course, if you’re an ambitious beginner, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t work with it – and no harm either.

The whole choreography is taught in Breakdown and Practice sections with several repetitions to music for the practice part. Here I think that calling out the moves – very minimally – would really help because there are often three steps to learning: breakdown, explanation, tips etc, a try-out with music and cues, and finally progress to dancing along with the music. After each segment you also have a “From the Top” section which I think is very useful indeed. I wish all choreography videos would follow this. [Read more →]

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Okay, so Volumes 2 and 3 of Belly by Sandra are here. In my review of Volume 1, I had said that all of the basic basic material should have been together, either on one disk or a set of two. It seemed strange that many upper body moves were not covered then. A learner shouldn’t have to wait for the such a large chunk of basic instruction – this would mean she would turn to other DVDs. I’m also surprised to see no strong continuity from Volume 1 to 2… such as in the menu style, the way variations and combinations are handled, etc.

Well, now it’s here and with it is Volume 3 on which Sandra teaches a choreography. I’d have opted to start a new set of volumes for the choreographies. But let me stop nitpicking and get down to having a look at Volume 2.

The strength of Belly by Sandra, right through from Volume 1, is that she manages to put an extraordinary amount of advice, explanations and tips without getting boring. On Volume 2, we start with a pretty and neat menu.

Instruction

The neat and logical structure in the instruction section divides everything into explanation and practice sub sections. For all sections and subsections though, Sandra gives you corrective advice. She tells you what you could do wrong, what you need to be careful about, what you can do to make the movement look better, and what to avoid to make it look bad. All of this advice, as I’d said earlier, isn’t tedious because even the explanation sections begin with demos and breakdown and you can start working with her.

Arms: In her arms section – which is always a good idea on a beginner’s DVD, Sandra gives excellent tips. She shows you a breakdown of the iconic snake arms, but she also you how to make your arms look longer, how to prevent shoulder injury, and more. She takes up a variation or combination which uses folded in snake arms and a large S curve pose. I wish there was more here, but well, the practice drill would help a beginner with building in the lift of the chest and arms and making movements graceful. Perhaps one variation which gets another move going…say a pelvic circle in addition to the arm move, would have been useful because that multitasking is something important to try out right in the beginning – more so than the Turkish Drop demonstrated on this video, in fact.

Shoulder shimmy: This is an excellent section, mercifully different from the usual and replete with tips I haven’t seen before, including how to keep the shoulder shimmy a shoulder shimmy. The variation is clever because it will make the learner use different speeds and isolate better as just one shoulder is used for a small portion. There are also good safety tips here.

Undulations:First there’s an undulation prep section. Here, Sandra explains the segments of this whole body move and shows you how to bring in different muscles. She shows you how to activate the diaphragm muscles for this move by inhaling, and by using a few tricks. She also explains in detail how to engage and strengthen the middle segment of your abs.. This prep section even has a practice session of its own and some challenging variations with level  change.

The main full body undulation section goes in-depth into this classic belly dance move. I find a few of the poses a bit awkward here though I understand there’s some extent of exaggeration to teach the dancer how to really engage right to the depth of the pelvic floor for this move. I find Sandra does this move a little differently from others — or so it seems anyway. This is specially for the lower half of the move. I am a little uncomfortable with the undulation here, but opinions and counter opinions on this are welcome.

Variations on undulations and the traveling camel include a version that uses the releve plie, a dipping undulaiton that many will be familiar with, and the second has a lift lift and dip right down with a big level drop to come up rolling. Watch out if you have bad knees.

An undulation combination is a rather nice addition here. However, the whole undulation section has the same slight awkwardness that I am not comfortable with. This photo from the combination shows what I’m talking about:

Reverse undulations of course have their very own section. It would take a while to put her tips into action. It’s a short section which goes on to the practice to a very upbeat piece of music. Variations, in their own section, include walking with the reverse (forwards and to the side) .

The reverse combo has pelvic drops and some footwork, shoulder pushes and chest drops with the reverse undulation.

The Turkish Drop!

Sandra doesn’t say you need to actually do the Turkish Drop but she includes it if you’re curious to see how it’s done. She also believes that it has elements used in other moves that need to be done correctly. That said, I still believe it doesn’t belong on a beginner’s instructional. In fact, it would have done fine as a bonus on the choreography DVD. I won’t give it away by putting in a picture and spoiling the surprise.

Large Hip Circle: Sandra’s favorite move is covered in some detail. Here again, I find she dips her chin into the chest almost on every repetition. I don’t know if this is a stylization and again, that’s something I’d welcome inputs on. Variations include traveling with the circle and some very nice  arm variations. I haven’t seen some of these before in fact. Also some variations on how the chest is used. Deep hip circles are also shown. The large hip circle section actually has the most variations of any move on the video. There’s one final and absolutely beautiful lean with the large circle. I don’t want to spoil the surprise with a photo of it. All the variations together with music make for a wonderful large circle session – except for the chin-to-chest part.

The large circle combo actually begins with some medium circles before getting into some of the more exotic large ones. It’s a danceable combo that includes undulations and more.

Twists: This section begins with some safety tips because you can get injured if you’re too enthusiastic. There’s a nice upbeat practice segment. The short combo for twists focuses on weight change. This is also a nice one you can take straight into your dance.

Finally, there’s a big practice section where you can go through the whole lot of the previous practice segments together. Cues appear on screen.

Sandra’s performance here is to a lovely Latin sounding piece of music. It’s a live performance, evidently not filmed for this video in particular. Sadly, they have the camera on her hips some of the time without showing the whole figure — common problem.

Tags: Belly dance videos // 16 Comments »

Flawless Floorwork is really quite a gorgeous video. From the cover to the menu, to the content – to the dancer-instructor, Ruby. A very elegant and graceful dancer, she’s a great choice as a teacher for this very challenging area of belly dance.

Strengthen first!

Floorwork is zero-tolerant of clumsiness. You have to do moves that are difficult and require a lot of strength and control and any lapses can result in your looking terrible at the very least, and getting injured at the most.

After a good long introduction and explanation of what the video program contains, Ruby goes into an all-important strength section. This is based entirely on Pilates. Unlike on other videos, it isn’t just about three ab strengthening exercises. From the breathing to the imprinting of the spine, you go through the principles that make Pilates effective and safe. The actual exercises include some of the basic favorites – the hundred, criss-cross, single and double leg stretch etc. In my opinion many more exercises could have been included = and some tougher ones, in fact. The core really does need strengthening for floorwork and it wouldn’t have been at all out of place to have a few more challenging exercises.

I also think that the preparatory section could have been about twice as long. Many yoga exercises or the usual dance conditioning routines would fit well here because you need flexibility to the max here. Of course, it’s only because I have so many other videos that I can easily just use another one and work on it before getting into Ruby’s Pilates based routine.

But thank god there isn’t an entire section on the isolations from scratch. No beginner should be doing floorwork anyway, so it’s perfectly in order to have left all that out.

It’s technique time

The Technique section, the heart of it all, is where Ruby explains how it’s done. From how to kneel and place your feet and toes, to kneeling isolations and spins and crawls to extensions, hip spins, undulations, and layouts, Ruby explains, demonstrates and practices each technique carefully with safety tips throughout. The section is broken into sub sections accessible from the menu, in case you want to work with one. There’s no skimping on the safety tips, thankfully, and wherever needed, there’s alternatives are given. These sub sections don’t include separate practice sessions but there are a few repetitions of each move. This works well, actually. You focus full time on observing, trying out, learning, taking note of precautions instead of dancing along too much and missing out on important information. All in all, I’m very impressed with how much advice Ruby gives while explaining technique.

Descents and Ascents

Often the toughest part of floorwork, ascents and descents need special attention, which is what they get on this DVD. Again, sticking to the same style as with the technique, Ruby explains different methods for each and spells out what you should be careful about. I particularly love her “Dragon Down” method of lowering to the floor, a slow graceful spiraling method that looks very elegant.

Two combinations

Giving you more than enough to work with, the two combinations are long and meaty. There’s a basic and an advanced one and they’re both full of moves that you can draw from to shorten or lengthen or make your own combinations. My only protest, as with other Cheekygirls DVDs, is that one needs drills to also have some cues and call out. A separate music only section is fine for when you’ve reached a certain level of practice, but before that, you do need voice cues as you go through a long combination. Specially so with a floorwork combo where you can’t possibly be keeping track of what’s happening on screen and must give all your attention to your form and accuracy if you’re to avoid injuring yourself.

Extras

Extras can come in all varieties and are often fairly useless. But on this DVD, you get a nice 10-minute backstage warm up. There’s also a costuming tutorial and tips on how to avoid wardrobe malfunctions. Finally of course there’s a performance by Ruby.  And yes, of course it includes floorwork.

I’ll say again that I find Flawless Floorwork really well-instructed and one of CheekyGirls’ most content-rich DVDs. I’m not sure I can do any of this because of issues with my knees, but even so one can learn a lot about grace, arms and the dance in general.

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Call it what you like, I will always think of this as “East Coast II”. I’ll call it that for the purposes of this preview and will call the first one, East Coast Tribal Bellydance,  East Coast I.

From the start, I can’t help comparing. Both East Coasts are meant for beginners. Having been there, I think that actually both are for advanced beginners. It took me some years to get anywhere near that certain look Sera creates in East Coast I. And it was very hard work indeed. Well, I think that in many ways, East Coast II is a step up or a companion video to East Coast I. I have to say at the outset though, I’m such a fan of Sera’s and of this particular style of dancing, I don’t terribly care who it’s meant for and how it relates to the first video. If she were to create ten videos, I’d want the lot and that is the truth. And that’s even when the only difference were a change in costume. I’d still want them. I just love the elegance with which Sera and her Solstice Ensemble move – like art in space.

There’s an absolutely huge description of East Coast II on the World Dance New York website. So I won’t bother going into what the contents are. You have everything detailed there, including the time for each section. I’ll put down instead, my first impressions.

This time we open with a whole lot more Solstice girls. They look a shade less funky than the first group and are not as beautifully costumed, but they all move beautifully. Many dancers will be happy to know that they’ll see all body types here.  Not everyone is stick thin.

This time the warm up is fast fast fast. Absolute beginners will have a tough time with that. You have to have done some warm ups and be familiar with some concepts like the flat back, lunges, etc. And all the safety issues associated. The warm is also more like a dance on this video. One should watch it a couple of times before dancing along, because of that pace. Also you should note where to look during each move because that’s very much part of each position. Don’t approach it with various injuries to the knees and back because there are level drops. It’s a lot of fun.

The movement meditation will remind you of the second segment of East Coast I. It’s really an extended version of that where you use continuous flowing full upper body circles to go into an empowering meditative dance trance. It’s very relaxing and massage-like. I particularly like that part.

After this, the format is quite unique. Each section that follows is a drill, a technique refresher, a workout and a combination at the same time. Oh, and did I forget to say, also a massage because most sections are made up of nice full body stretchy moves. They use full range of movement.

The arms section (which is the first drill-combo-practice-whatever) starts with serpentine arm moves. We practice different positions and arm and hand flexibility. Sera’s armwork is graceful right to the fingertips. As with the first DVD, freeze at any point and you’ll find a sculpted pretty picture because Sera’s form is absolute perfection.

The upper body strengthening drill-combo is a solid little workout for the torso with large range circles and controlled pops. This is where you get nice and flexible.

There are two combos that focus on hipwork and let me tell you, both are very upbeat indeed. The first combo is short but intense and packed with a lot of movements to practice. It’s hugely fun, again. It’s the one I got first time. The second combo is full of shimmies

A third hip combo is all about the smooth moves. Horizontal eights too, though they’re not so frequently seen in tribal fusion.

The whole lot of these combos goes and becomes a choreography, just as with the first East Coast. The style is very much the same except the combos here are all more upbeat. The combos are demonstrated, drilled and finally danced un-cued as one choreography to similarly funky music.

Finally there’s a  tribal fusion performance by Sera followed by another that is not the usual dark fusion but more oriental in style. .

Tags: Belly dance videos // 6 Comments »

If you ask dancers how they learned to improvise belly dancing, they will probably tell you that it comes with time and practice. And they would be right. Belly dancing is what I call a lifetime dance – not something you can really do with any depth unless you spend enough time on it.

So, within this genre of dance, improvisation is the toughest aspect to learn. This is because it means the dancer needs a solid repertoire of dance moves that she can recall readily because they’re ingrained in her muscle memory. You don’t want to be bothered with worrying about the movement itself, if you’re trying to keep moves coming as the music progresses. You also need to understand a lot about the structure of dance, how it is understood by the audience. And of course, it’s finally all about the music and how the dancer can express herself with it.

Not surprising then that improvising should come about gradually. Instructional videos have traditionally given a learner the components. But that done, they ask you to “just dance”. This was the situation until Nadira Jamal’s Improvisation Toolkit came along. Volume 1, released in December 2008 and took up movement recall. This second volume focuses on structure – which may sound boring, but is far from it.

What it’s about

Improvisation Toolkit 2 gets right into how you can structure your dance. Improvisation doesn’t mean you can just “scribble” or come up with random moves, even if they fit. There must be patterns and arrangements. Human beings feel comfortable with patterns, sometimes seeing them where they don’t even exist. Strucureless dancing would leave both dancer and audience confused and dissatisfied. This video is a deep exploration of various aspects of these patterns to make up the whole structure.

How it works

Dancer and instructor, Nadira, uses exercises throughout her DVD to make sense of improvisation. Those familiar with Vol 1 and her Taktaba podcasts will know the style of these exercises. They’re logical, almost mathematical, and very practical. In fact, you could think of this video as a workbook on belly dance improvisation. The exercises are guided and then fill-in-the-blanks. Exercises also get increasingly complex as we get deeper into the subject.

What’s covered

The menu that you’ll find as the DVD opens up runs into 7 screens. Even though everything is detailed and accessible separately as is the style of menus on belly dance DVDs today, it still gives you some idea of how much content there is here and how specific it is. The warm up is the same as on Vol 1 – which is fine. We begin the instruction with several chapters on continuity and how to use it to aid improvisation. Nadira’s movement analysis and understanding of audience psychology come into their own as she takes up exercises on how to keep repetition fresh. Some of this will be familiar to those who have seen the Taktaba episodes and been through the AAAB, etc exercises though the exercises here are different. Repetition with entire combinations is also taken up, with the exercises getting quite complex and challenging as more segments are left for you to fill in.  Another structural concept Nadira explored is Theme and Variation, a particularly satisfying format for audiences. Nadira shows you how to incorporate a theme and make variations on it – again with examples and exercises. Lots of them.

Next, there is a section on the compositional skeleton, chunks that you can take from a choreography or your safety riffs and using them. Nadira shows you how to create combinations on the fly with these. The final section is a Plug and Play Choreography. This is where parts of the dance are given, and some are left for you to fill in. This begins with an analysis of the song’s structure.

There’s also a movement glossary on this video.

What the quality is like

If there’s one place this video falls short it’s on production quality. It’s far better than a no-frills video but nowhere near other well-produced ones. The sound is uneven across the video, though it isn’t inaudible anywhere. Nadira talks a little too fast in some places. In this volume, the camera is too close on Nadira and often you see her turn towards the camera a fraction too fast. The exercises are actually a lot of fun and the video very well conceptualized – if it had been slickly produced, it would have been a killer. Luckily, belly dancers are very tolerant of less-than-ideal quality and I don’t expect these minor points to make a difference because the content is great.

Who’s it for?

Much like the first volume, this instruction could benefit any level of dancer who feels she needs help with improvisation. I happen to think it’ll be particularly nice for learners who are just past absolute beginner stage. Seasoned dancers may find these exercises very helpful when conducting classes. If you have the first volume, you’ll probably be wondering whether you need this one. Well, the aspects of improvisation taken up are different so if you’re not yet comfortable with improvising, yes.

There are three major strengths I see with the instruction on this (and the previous) DVD:

1. It’s analytical and logical and explains things so they make sense
2. It’s practical and makes improvisation doable with exercises
3. It’s usable because it enhances your understanding of the audience’s understanding

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I have the privilege of being the first in the world to see the preview to Rachel Brice’s upcoming set of 2 DVDs, Serpentine. And I am thrilled.

I was frankly a bit disappointed with the earlier two releases because one was just too much yoga and the second didn’t give enough after the preparatory phase.

Well, this set of videos is also about preparation and technique. But it also has two whole choreographies! Rachel Brice, looking warmer and friendlier here, says the videos are suited to all levels…right from those who want some of the basic work needed for intense tribal fusion dancing, to those who want to take the dancing up a notch with backbends and strong confident level changes. There’s a yoga section here as well – one third of the whole program, as I gather, and then there’s technique and shimmy drills and adding upper body moves on top of hipwork. Two choreographies at two different levels is amazing as well.

Rachel Brice describes the set of videos as a toolkit of technique elements and classes for consistent progress in dance.

This absolute queen of tribal fusion has worked very hard to get where she is!

Sera: Foundations of Bellydance – East Coast Tribal

Amazingly.. Belly by Sandra Vol 2 and 3!

and a choreography on Vol 3

And Turkish from Ruby

Tags: Belly dance videos // 6 Comments »

There are some videos dancers use to death. They rely on them over time practically swear by them, and recommend them passionately to others. Dancer’s Library is an attempt to list these.The list can include proven-over-time items and ones with high potential to be in this category.

A Dancer’s Library DVD should have, potentially or provenly, these:

• Good structure
• Comprehensive content
• Long shelf life or ‘replay value’
• Use across different learning levels

Dancer’s Library begins – in no particular order:

_________________________________________________________

Aziza’s Ultimate Practice Companion

In an informal too-crowded class setting, a constantly lively Aziza takes her students through a warm up and arms segment to move on to a grueling set of drills. This video could have been better produced but that doesn’t stop it from being a permanent favorite of belly dancers. The content a workshop like structure and is, years after its release, still unusual. Accessible to learners of all levels but anyone finds it tough to go through the whole lot at one go.

Instant Belly Dancer

Every belly dancer will be familiar with this vision of Neon flowing out of a teacup. The groundbreaking Instant Bellydancer, in a set of two volumes, Curves and Hipwork, still has no exact parallel in the dance DVD world. Graphic overlays and detailed instruction take the learner through all the basic moves – and then some. There are also combos and in the remake, practice sessions. Even if your style is different, this is keepable and referable for precision and technique.

21 Shimmies and 1001 Variations

The 1001 variations are up to you, but Leyla Jouvana definitely demonstrates and teaches the most frequently used shimmies in this encyclopedic video.With her husband Roland on the drums, Leyla shows how each shimmy is done from each angle and leads you through a few rounds of repetition. Long time dancers use this video to brush up on and refresh their shimmy repertoire.There’s a Vol 2 to this DVD though one can’t say how much of a must-have library item that is or will be.

Ansuya’s Hot Combinations

Of all the combination videos the one you’re most likely to find across everyone’s collections is this. A detailed breakdown of seven distinctive combinaitons, this program truly stood out at a time when there weren’t so many others. The combinations are unique and are not of the standard type that make up the bulk of one’s dancing. They are actually not beginner friendly, but each fragment has been demonstrated and practiced from every angle, so most people will be able to get something out of this. The format is almost standard for IAMED DVDs. The second volume is somehow less likely to be in every dancer’s library.

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As I populate this list, hopefully talking to people and getting their opinions, feel free to give suggestions on which titles you think should or should not be there. Also which new titles should be recommended as must-have library items. Does Jehan’s Sacred Bellydance belong in this list? Does Drills Drills Drills? What about Delilah’s workshop set? New dancers will really learn from suggestions and counter-suggestions.

Tags: Belly dance videos // 10 Comments »

We typically don’t think of arm and hand moves as layering, but when you think of it, that’s precisely what it is. You have to do your intricate repertoire of belly dance moves and do something creative and beautiful with your hands and arms at the same time. That’s the big challenge. So: any arms instructional should look not just at pathways and poses, but show you how to combine them with the other moves.

In her DVD, Aziza does try to do just that – work at your muscle memory. Has she done a brilliant job? No, I wouldn’t say so. But is her DVD worth working with? Yes, I definitely thought so.

Aziza starts with a welcome and advice and goes straight into a gentle short warm up. Although the warm up doesn’t have a lot of arm moves, that’s really okay because the drills that follow ease into exercises. [Read more →]

Tags: Belly dance videos // 13 Comments »

The series
Hard Candy joined its sister videos, Luscious and Love Potion, in my collection, a couple of weeks ago.

I love so many things about this series as a whole! First, a thorough welcome or preview tells you exactly what the instruction contains and will do for you. No false promises. Having worked with many fitness videos, I’m very grateful when an instructor takes the trouble to tell you what to focus on and what to expect rather than getting into that awful cheer-leading mode that is so common.

The second thing I love is that there is a complete beginner’s guide or tutorial to belly dance basics on each of the three videos. There are subtle differences and I know that many dancers have found these tutorials great to work with, even for those who’ve been dancing a while. The tutorials are led by Neon, whose brainchild this series happens to be. Teaching absolute basics is her specialty. You can access each set of basic movements separately.  There is nothing rushed about these tutorials. There’s detailed logical explanation, suggestions for replacement moves if you’re a beginner, and friendly tips delivered in Neon’s own gentle manner.

A practice flow segment adds practice basics and the combinations from the workout to music. There’s also a music-only option. [Read more →]

Tags: Belly dance videos // 1 Comment »

I’m sure most of us are ready to believe that the dog is man’s best friend. But did we know that they actually seem to understand us even better than our closest relatives (no, not those ones) the chimpanzee? Oh yes, they do. And we understand them right back.

Studies of the eye movements of dogs when they look at us show that they do so in exactly the same way as humans do with each other – they look slightly more at the left side of the face. They respond easily to our instructions, emotions and needs. When they recorded different barks and played them back to people, there was remarkable unanimity on what those barks meant; for example, give me the ball, who’s this stranger on the other side of the fence, untie me, etc. But how did dogs get to be so tuned in to human beings? Is it that they’re socialized wolves and foxes? In fact, would wolves behave the same if they’re kept as pets? [Read more →]

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