Dance class last night was a great workout & also fun; the lights dimmed, the music loud, coin belts and bared bellies, all feet and thighs and arms in unison. We missed class the week before due to our instructor’s illness, and I think she wanted to make up for lost time because we did lots of strenuous muscle-building side-to-side kinds of motions, called silly names like the choo-choo, the camel, the back-back-drop. In truth we don’t name the moves so much as use words to describe them, especially combinations of hip articulations, like horizontal figure-8, staircase, and cat’s whiskers.
Some moves come from ballet, such as arabesques and rondejambes, and the names for some moves come from Middle Eastern dance, such as taxsim and maya, both of which are vertical figure-8s drawn with the hips, it just depends on which way the hips travel.
In class I like watching other dancers move; some people have a keen sense for melody, others seek out the rhythm and the changes in tempo. We practiced the choreography; got it to the point where our instructor doesn’t have to count out the moves. It’s exhilarating when I can see everyone in the big wall mirrors moving forward with a triplet-step followed by a spin; the song is a Lebanese wedding song boom-boom-boom BOOM boom, funky 12 beat rhythm easy to find if you can catch it at the beginning, hard to discern if you try and pick it up in the middle. Our teacher also showed the traditional folkloric dance step to the song & we all joined sweaty hands & swung stomping, always with the same foot to the left, leaning back at the pause, around in a circle following her. It would have been much more interesting if I had been drunk.
More dancing today—I have a dancing date with Jesi & R to practice our trio choreography. R insists on calling it a “threesome,” especially when she talks to men. She is naughty and very very funny. I’m excited with the creation of the choreo… it’s one thing to dance free-form to a song, and another thing altogether to create a meaningful choreography shared by three dancers so they don’t look like showgirls on a chorus line or kids doing a lip-synch in a school talent show. I think we’re doing a good job but the final project will have to speak for itself. We'll be performing it in December, which leaves only two months for completing and praticing the choreography and making costumes. I have nothing better to do.
Some moves come from ballet, such as arabesques and rondejambes, and the names for some moves come from Middle Eastern dance, such as taxsim and maya, both of which are vertical figure-8s drawn with the hips, it just depends on which way the hips travel.
In class I like watching other dancers move; some people have a keen sense for melody, others seek out the rhythm and the changes in tempo. We practiced the choreography; got it to the point where our instructor doesn’t have to count out the moves. It’s exhilarating when I can see everyone in the big wall mirrors moving forward with a triplet-step followed by a spin; the song is a Lebanese wedding song boom-boom-boom BOOM boom, funky 12 beat rhythm easy to find if you can catch it at the beginning, hard to discern if you try and pick it up in the middle. Our teacher also showed the traditional folkloric dance step to the song & we all joined sweaty hands & swung stomping, always with the same foot to the left, leaning back at the pause, around in a circle following her. It would have been much more interesting if I had been drunk.
More dancing today—I have a dancing date with Jesi & R to practice our trio choreography. R insists on calling it a “threesome,” especially when she talks to men. She is naughty and very very funny. I’m excited with the creation of the choreo… it’s one thing to dance free-form to a song, and another thing altogether to create a meaningful choreography shared by three dancers so they don’t look like showgirls on a chorus line or kids doing a lip-synch in a school talent show. I think we’re doing a good job but the final project will have to speak for itself. We'll be performing it in December, which leaves only two months for completing and praticing the choreography and making costumes. I have nothing better to do.
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