Register for the 3-Day Level 1 workshop with Suhaila, in Washington, DC

Register now for the three-day Level 1 workshop with the one and only Suhaila Salimpour!

www.dctribal.com/suhaila2008.html

Please e-mail any questions, comments, or concerns to dctribal [at] gmail [dot] com

Hope to see you there!

Save the date - Mira Betz in Washington, DC, Sept 6-7

Save the date! A weekend with Mira Betz in Washington, DC, on September 6th and 7th! Presented by MeaHuna Productions, this dance-filled weekend will include two full days with Mira as well as a gala evening performance on Saturday featuring some of the region's best dancers.

Mira will be sharing with us these four sessions:

:Saturday:
- Isolations and Layering: A Slow Build to Complicated Layering
- In Praise of Improv: Exercises to Gain Proficiency at Improvisation

:Sunday:
- The Art of Professional Performance
- The Passion, The Drama: Adding a Full Range of Emotions to Your Dance

Keep up with MeaHuna Productions at www.meahunaproductions.com
Subscribe to our RSS feed: www.meahunaproductions.com/
Questions? E-mail us! info[at]meahunaproductions[dot]com

Registration and workshop information coming soon!

A Mentoring Program?

(reposted from The Biz of Belly Dance tribe)

So, I was blogging tonight and I thought of something that we have in my day job but don't seem to have in bellydance: a mentoring program. Basically, at my work there's a network of experienced employees who volunteer to be paired up with new employees seeking guidance from a mentor. The mentors and "mentees", as we call them, don't need to work in the same subject matter or even sit in the same space. The idea is that the mentee has one specific person they can go to for professional guidance.

I thought, "damn, it would be awesome if we had something like that for bellydance!" I thought of this because I realized that in the age of myriad instructional videos and YouTube, there are probably a lot more aspiring dancers now who are learning primarily through visual media than in-person classes than there were even just five years ago. These dancers need guidance to become the best dancers they can be, not only technically but ethically. These dancers might not have a mentor to turn to when they have questions about performing, costuming, technique, or other subjects.

If there were a bellydance mentoring program, would you participate? Do you think it would be worth your time to guide a few instructor-less dancers a few hours a week (or even less as the case may be)?

A different kind of drum solo.

Prog raqs at Spring Caravan. (Prog rock? Prog raqs! haha.... er... yeah... anyway...)

Music by none other than Alex Lifeson (guitar) and Neil Peart (drums). I hope I've done their music justice. These guys and their band have inspired me as an artist and dancer so much. This piece is sort of a little tribute to that.

www.youtube.com/watch

A call for integrity in belly dance periodicals.

Why is it that belly dance periodicals don't seem to pride themselves on well-crafted, objective, and thought-provoking writing, and instead publish poorly-written, subjective, insulting, and inflammatory articles? Are we belly dancers as a community that nasty, ill-educated, catty, and insecure?

I would like to say that on the whole, most of us are well-educated, nice, and generally good people. If an outsider read the most popular of our online periodicals and message boards, she would not get that impression.

This dancer is tired of the poorly written articles that value style over substance and controversy over content.

Here's what I wish for:

* Articles written by dancers who are experts on the subject matters on which they are writing.
* Articles that focus on the art and history of this dance, rather than the gimmicks and controversies.
* Authors who can proofread their own writing, or have the foresight to have a colleague proofread for them.
* Authors who check their facts.
* Authors who can identify and check their assumptions about other styles and dancers.
* Authors who can take the time to spell other dancers' names correctly.
* Authors who, if presented with a DVD or CD to review, have the honesty to tell the periodical, "I am not qualified to review this, so please ask someone else who knows more about this style/subject/dancer."
* Performance and product reviews that are neither hate-fests nor love-fests, but are objective and analytical dissections of the performance or product in question.
* Authors who, if they are offended by a particular style or dancer, do not immediately write an emotionally charged article for the sake of stirring up controversy. We are all passionate about something in this dance, yes, but we don't need to go insulting others to show others how passionate we are.
* In relation to the previous point, authors who, when faced with something that offends them, take the time to understand and conduct some research on the offending style/dancer.
* Authors and articles who don't resort to commenting on the appearance or costuming of a dancer. (Please comment on the quality of the dancing; frankly I don't care if someone was dancing in a baggy sweatshirt and sweatpants or if she's in a $1000 Eman.)
* Publications who seek out quality authors, rather than just allowing their friends and favorite dancers to write articles.

I find it ironic (explained below) that one of the only surviving popular and prolific periodicals is the Gilded Serpent. Most of the Gilded Serpent's articles are either insipid "reviews" of recent events which merely describe a dancer's lovely new Bella bedlah or who performed at a recent stage show, or the articles are ignorant attempts that insult fusion styles of dance. The Gilded Serpent's core authors appear to have an agenda: one that praises the old school and degrades those of us experimenting and pushing this dance forward for a new generation of dancers. To its credit, the Gilded Serpent does accept articles by guest authors; however, I feel that these articles are lost in the cacophany of criticism and nearly substance-free articles. I feel that the Gilded Serpent has become the tabloid of belly dance news, and yet so many people continue to read it... because there are so few other options.

I assume (yes, I could be wrong) that most of the Gilded Serpent's readership is the same population of dancers that lament the passing of the more scholarly paper publications of Habibi and Arabesque, both of which developed a well-earned reputation for well-crafted, well-researched, and honest reporting on our dance. Where are all of those dancers who read these periodicals? Wouldn't you want to see our dance's publications rise up to the high standards that these now defunct periodicals set? Or did these publications perish because we as a community don't really have an appetite for academic research and writing on our dance? I would hope that isn't the case, but I fear that the passing of these magazines indicates that our community would rather wallow in insults and subjective ass-kissing and back-biting than to take the high road of objectivity, research, and integrity in our written products.

Whirlwind of life.

Dance is officially a 2nd full-time job... I have so much going on that i hardly feel like I have any free time at all! I do enjoy being busy, but sometimes a break is needed. So, today I took a sick day (my sore throat, coughing, and stuffy nose insisted), and caught up on some dance business... and I'm not even done.

But here are some things coming up in the near future:

MAY 2008:
Tribal Fest 8: Performing on Friday, May 16th at 9:13pm. Awesome time slot! Thanks Chuck and Kajira!

Sestraluna show with Kami Liddle and Petite Jamilla: I'll be performing in the gala show, hosted by Sestraluna, in Brooklyn Park, MD. May 24th. More info at sestraluna.com/workshops.html

JUNE 2008:
Spring Caravan: Teaching and performing on Saturday of this fusion festival, in Somerset, New Jersey. Check out www.rakkasah.com/spring June 7th.

Raqs America: I'll be teaching and performing at the BDSS Raqs America event in Washington, DC. The RA website isn't up quite yet, but it's scheduled to go live really soon. I'm so excited to be a part of this event! June 21st.

Gothalyptic: Teaching and performing at this mini gothic bellydance fest in the Louisville, Kentucky area. Check it out here: www.tl2productions.com/gothalyptic.htm June 28th.

SEPTEMBER 2008:
Mt Zion Music and Dance Fest: Hosted by Rom Deussen. I'll be performing to live music by the awesome and amazing Helm, as well as teaching a workshop.

OCTOBER 2008:
Tribal Alchemy: Teaching and performing at the third annual Tribal Alchemy in Dallas/Ft. Worth, Texas. I'm so honored to be a part of this event, teaching along side such amazing dancers as Mira Betz, Elizabeth Strong, and Frederique. October 18-19.

2009:
TribalCon! I'll be an official instructor at TribalCon in 2009! Details coming soon!

Web difficulties.

So... I was trying to install WordPress on my asharah.com website and goobered up some things. So, until I figure out what the heck I did, the main page, www.asharah.com will give you a weird error message. If you really want to take a look at my site, go to www.asharah.com/news.htm and the rest of the site will work fine from there.

Sometimes technology just doesn't want to behave!



EDIT: Nevermind! Fixed it! MySQL will bow to my superior (uh, yeah, right) web skilz.

A blog of thoughts.

So, I've started a more formal blog about dance, life, philosophy, learning, and creativity over on Blogger.

My first couple of posts will be on what it means to be a student, the responsibilities of instructors, and integrity in art. I'll also post images, other people's blogs, words of wisdom, and any other material that I find inspiring.

I hope that you enjoy this, and I hope that my thoughts help fuel your journey as a student, artist, and human.

If you're interested in reading my ramblings, please point your browser to bdpaladin.blogspot.com/

(Umm... I'll also explain why I'm "bdpaladin".)

Trailer for my DVD!

I'm so excited about this! Neon and WorldDanceNewYork have just created the trailer for my DVD. Check it out!

www.youtube.com/watch

Happy New Year!

And for the new year.... Maduro t-shirts, hoodies, and stickers.

www.cafepress.com/maduromusic