Foot, don't fail me now

My approach to my solo for the Charlottesville show this weekend is: keep the dancing small and controlled...
With less muscle strength and a wonky foot to deal with, my style has to adapt. No longer am I comfortable relying on my body to "just do it" - whatever "it" happened to be at the moment. My wonderful dancer's body was strong and reliable for many years and many shows, allowing me to whirl away with the music however I wanted... Now my body needs more careful use.

That's okay, I'm fine with that - aging is not a freak-out issue for me for some reason; I've never felt bad about getting older. Although of course I did used to hide my age when I performed professionally, as most dancers do. Feels so nice not to do that anymore!

I've edited my music (the gorgeous "Layal" by Hassim Saleh-Eddine) to about 7 minutes. It's a lovely Oriental piece one of my former students, Adara Janaani, gave me; it's hard to find online so I'm lucky to have it. During the opening I've been doing a bunch of spins, now my knees and the THR-hip are telling me to take it easy when rehearsing! So I'm only doing a few run-throughs at a time. No chance that it'll be "over-rehearsed"!

What I do wonder is how slippery the stage will be. The foot I broke a few years ago demands to be coddled in dance slippers; dancing barefoot is not an option. A couple of my youtube videos show me dancing on a super slippery stage, in fact, they're the videos from my last seminar show before I retired due to hip pain. Double whammy! But I feel pretty confident even about a slippery stage. I'm looking forward to seeing old friends and enjoying a wonderful night in the beautiful "Haven" of Charlottesville.

Dancing my butt off!

My dancing activities seem to've kicked into high gear lately - I've actually lost a few pounds without meaning to! And I really tired myself out this week teaching seven hours in 3 days... but it's all good. So it looks like I'll be using my "days off" to rehearse for the Charlottesville show on March 3... but I haven't yet decided which number to do. I really like my "Layali" pop, but also love the music I used in December, "Layal". Two very different songs! I'll try them both and see which speaks to me more, but I'm leaning toward the Oriental piece.

PRISM's latest shows are balls-to-the-wall dancing, with heavy engagement from the core dancers throughout the entire show; but according to the gal's feedback they are digging it. The show we have lined up for next Friday is only 30 minutes, but everyone will be onstage the entire time, unusual for us up to now. Makes for a seamless show though!

Here we are at the Culpeper Country Club after the show (photo courtesy of B&K Photography):

The Culpeper show - with the two numbers that had me going up and down from a kneeling position - went really well; and those two numbers are in this week's show too. If I can make that look effortless at our late rehearsals it should look okay in the actual show - that's my goal! It's shocking how fast muscle goes away when you don't use it, and it does NOT come back as quickly.

Recently Cassandra of MN was fundraising to pay for a hip replacement; she's one of the few professional bellydancers I've seen going public with this procedure. I'm glad she's raising awareness and also that she met her goal (around $15,000 for the deductible). I hope her recovery goes well - I'll be following with interest: Get Cassandra Dancing

Anthea / Kawakib
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each dance is a further step to recovery

So for our New Year's Eve show in Fredericksburg this year my performing group PRISM did a number called Ich Inta. This dance is like one of those old Mahmoud Reda Troupe choreographies where the group is on their knees in a circle while Farida Fahmy dances in the middle. I eschew putting myself in the "star spot" when dancing with my group, so I typically assign the soloist part to one of my students, this time to Nashida who dances very prettily in Egyptian style. That meant I (along with the rest of the group) had to get up and down from the kneeling position during the dance.

Well, it was really difficult for me to get up from the kneeling position when we started rehearsing, and I was worried about how awkward it looked; but with some practise several times a week (using a cane to help) I did finally work up the leg strength to do creditably well on stage when we performed on New Year's eve. That's a relief!

Now we're working up another choreography with several up-and-downs to do! So this is great for my leg muscles; and wouldn't you know, it turns out I have to use my non-favorite kneeling leg too. I always love it when bellydance itself provides the exercise my body needs.

I'm a big believer using real belly dance moves for body conditioning whenever possible... now on to the next show!

Anthea / Kawakib
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what's in the baskets?

This New Year's Eve, PRISM is debuting our "Basket Dance" which is just a bunch of fun, really. One of those dances we do for ourselves! One reason is the raucous beledi music, Luxor Baladna (Afrah Baladna Said). Yeah, YOU know what I mean! A definite party piece.

The New Year's Eve show looks fun all around actually. One more rehearsal tomorrow night...then on to First Night in Fredericksburg on Saturday!

So we've had a Class Holiday this week and last week, and outside of one rehearsal I've done NO dancing... just letting my body rest. BUT, you know how it is when you're used to bellydancing - you can only go so long without it! Your body wants to do it even if you're not planning on it. So I've been breaking into "spontaneous yoga", in other words, Chakra Isolations. I love how that happens! I love chakra isolations anyway, and when my body does that I remember I need to move, so when that starts to happen I just focus on doing them as usual, from bottom to top or vice versa; or sometimes just a few in whatever chakra wants to move! I don't think I've written an article on doing the Chakra Isolations yet, but I did mention them in this post - they're something I learned from my wonderful former student Shakti.

...and what's in the baskets? Beans of course!

Happy New Year!

- Anthea / Kawakib
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