Yasmina's Joy of Belly Dancing

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

"It is What it is" MAC show on May 16, 2009

What a great day Saturday was! Very long and fun!!!

My intermediate belly dance classes were invited to perform four numbers in the show. Marlina Kessler director of the dance companies at the Mesa Art Center (MAC) invited us to be a part of her show.

My cabaret class performed a sword routine and a Lebanese Pop number and my tribal class performed a tribal drum solo and Voi routine.

Here are the links on YouTube to the performances from the night:
Tribal Fusion Drum Solo
Voi
Sword
Lebanese Pop

The day started out with dress rehearsal for the "it is what it is" show at the MAC. Of course nothing is ever on time and today was no exception :-) Dress rehearsal was supposed to start at 10:30 so we all got there at 9:30 and you guessed it full dress rehearsal started at noon!

I was hoping to make lots of mistakes through out our numbers because we all know a bad dress rehearsal makes for an awesome show :0) I didn't make any horrible mistakes but enough to know it was going to be a great show!

Dress rehearsal ended just after 2:00 so we all headed home to make adjustments to costumes, get something to eat and try to relax before heading back to the theater at 5:30.

The show started right on time and ran smoothly. Our first number was the tribal drum solo and there were 7 of us. It's difficult in the video to see faces due to the lights on the stage and my husband sitting in the balcony filming. Back row left to right Dena, Kay, Debbie, Michele and front row Me, Elizabeth and Dawn. Check out those crazy lights the tech group was giving us along with the patterns that they were putting on stage. I told them to do what ever they would like and they did :-)

Our next number was the Voi dance or poi veil. There was not a lot of room on stage for the 11 of us plus the Voi but we did it! If feel that the veils purpose in life is to mess up the dancer; sometimes veils can be so flowing and really add beauty to one's dance than the exact same veil can turn on you and make your life miserable! So was my veil the night of the show. It was going well until it wrapped around my arm and I needed to spin in the opposite direction from my fellow dancers. Than during the 8's it decided it no longer wanted to stay in my hand but I got it back right away. The rest of the dance it calmed down and started to behave and looked gorgeous spinning around :0) Everyone did great on this number what an array of color!!! Back row left to right Kay, Melissa, Debbie, Renee / middle row Michele, Lisa, Elizabeth and front row Jackie, Me, Nicole and Dawn.

The second half of the show we started with the sword dance. Although I taught this routine to my cabaret class it has the flavoring of tribal style; what can I say I'm a tribal girl :-) You go girls - no swords dropped!!!!! Back row left to right Margaret, Paula, Kay Beth / middle row Melissa, Lisa, Dawn, Kathy and front row Jackie, me and Dawn.

Our last number was the Lebanese Pop routine I learned from Jillina's new DVD series. I went into the second row next to the wings for this number to let my students shine they did a fantastic job on this routine and they didn't need me center stage. Back row Margaret, Paula, Kay, Beth / middle row me, Elizabeth, Nicole and front row Jackie, Kathy and Dawn.

I love performing with my students what a great group of women; they are such fun!!! Below are photos from the day and thanks Elizabeth for sending me the photos you took from the day.

back row left to right: Elizabeth, Renee, Melissa, Kay, Michele & Dawn - first row left to right: Jackie, Paula, Lisa, Beth and Nicole

back row left to right: Elizabeth, Kathy, Me, Kay, Margaret & Beth / front row left to right: Jackie, Nicole & Dawn

dressing room activity the night of the performance

Kay, Michele, Me and Renee

Nicole

Kay

Dena

Renee

Margaret

Paula & Beth

Michele & Debbie

Lisa

Elizabeth

Melissa

Beth

Until next show...Have fun!

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Craft projects for May 9th class

Hi Crafters,

Sorry this has taken so long to get this month's craft projects posted life has been really crazy!!!

Below are photos of the projects we will be making on Saturday.

Ribbon spool box

We will be using an empty ribbon spool to create a box. You will be able to put small goodies inside or make a photo album.

CD calendar 2010

Using 6 used CDs we will create a colorful calendar for next year. Hang it in your office, by your PC, by the phone were ever you need to check a calendar.

file folder album

Theme for the album is "friend" which could be a pet, a class buddy, co-worker, childhood buddy, family member like your mom, sister, etc. Mine is my hubby, he's my best friend :-) We will be taking a used or new file folder to create the album.

Enjoy your week and see you on Saturday...

Thursday, April 30, 2009

Plaza de Anaya Recital

Sunday April 26th was my first recital at Plaza de Anaya and what a great show. All the students did an incredible job in their dances.

This was the first session I taught at the studio and my class was single and double fan veil. I'm so proud of my students that performed with me that day. The first 4 weeks I focused on single fan veil and the last 4 weeks of the session I instructed double fan veils.

The video below is our performance of the double fan veils and Elaine and Karen did a tremendous job. They learned this dance in 4 weeks!!!

Elaine (left), Karen (right)

Elaine, me and Karen

Unfortunately my husband missed the single fan veil routine but he did get my performance of the double fan veils and my Voi routine the class I'm teaching this session.

My hubby and I had another event to go to that of course was the same time as the recital so we didn't see the rest of the recital. I performed 3 numbers and had to leave. I missed some really extraordinary performances :-(

Next recital I hope to be able to take photos of all the dancers and groups and share them with everyone.

It was a great weekend of dancing, 3 days in a row!!!

Double fan veil routine at Plaza de Anaya, music - Waiting Immigrant by REG Project from Arabianights: club & chillout classics

Voi performance at Plaza de Anaya, music - Lodi Garden by Desi Vibes from Dum Dum Project

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Fees Middle School Performance

Wow what a super busy weekend!!! On Friday night several instructors from Plaza de Anaya performed at the Fees Middle School Festival.

Thank goodness we were able to perform inside the auditorium on stage and what a show it was! Not only was both Tribal and Cabaret styles of belly dancing was represented there was also poi, staff and juggling.

My hubby was there to video and filmed several of us before the battery went dead and he couldn't find the replacement batteries in my bag. I think he was afraid to go into my bag and look :0)

Below are photos I took before the event and video of some of the dancing that night.

Morgiana

Lois and Edith

Rebecca (all above photos of members of Egyptian Cartouche)

members of Kamalah

Cari from Anaya Tribal

Jamie

Rahzi, Mia Donna, Cari and Kimberly

Egyptian Cartouche

Rebecca, myself, Lois and Edith

Tricia

Sunday, April 19, 2009

County Fair April 2009

What a perfect day to be dancing outside with a group of wonderful friends, my students. We arrived at the State Fair grounds in plenty of time. With freeway closures of the 202 and 101 it was difficult to get out of the East Valley! I hadn't been on the 60 in ages and wow all the changes along the way were amazing.

We caravanned in 4 cars and some how all arrived at the Fair grounds close together. There were 11 of us dancing at the fair; Michele, Kay, Dena and Melissa we missed you.

When we arrived at the Community Stage Santa Joe was there taking photos of all the belly dancers performing on Saturday; he was going to be there all day. Members from Desert Dancers from Casa Grande and Florence were performing after us so we had a great audience of fellow dancers along with friends and family.

I am so proud of my students they were tremendous and so much fun to dance with; they performed like pros! The stage was great although there were a few places where the wood was separating under the indoor outdoor carpet. It was a eerie feeling when you stepped on those spots wondering if you were going to go through the stage or not. This stage was 100 percent better, no 500 percent better than the State Fair stage we had last year :-)

Kudos to Shelbie for being our photographer during our performance; sensational job Shelbie you got some great shots!!! Below are photos of our performances and a few candid shots :0)