Hit, wave, and roll - Funkifying your bellydance and bellydancifying your funk.

My first (and last for the forseeable future) dance workshop in the Bay Area.

Hit, wave, and roll - How to funk-ify your bellydancing and applying bellydance technique to funk styles and hip hop.
We will be going over how to utilize bellydance technique to create illusory effects in popping, contracting different muscle groups to create a hit, breaking down boogaloo rolls in bellydance terminology, and flipping arm waves inside and out. I will also be discussing different dance styles that are commonly performed with popping, and the distinction between popping and locking.

Saturday July 18th 3-5pm $30 in advance, $35 at the door.
City Dance Studios
10 Colton St
San Francisco
www.citydance.org/map/
To sign up, you can paypal me at cleoflaptra@gmail.com. Contact me for my snail mail address if you want to send a check (or you can try and find me in person).

Tribal Fest Recap!!!!!

So, I ended up having a blast at TF this year, I'm so glad I went. I got to perform twice, at the Friday afterparty with Amar and DJ Dragonfly (who was great). A big thanks to Amar for letting me dance. And, as a last minute fill in, I performed at 1:42 on Saturday afternoon. I already had my wig and makeup done, and got the call as I was driving over to the fest. I'm glad I followed the 4 Ps - Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance, so I did not have to go on stage like a half make up drag queen (NOT PRETTY). After which I got to relax for the entire weekend, hang out, and enjoy the dancing (AND SHOPPING!!). I was lucky enough to stay with a bunch of hot potters, so i had lots of great peeps to hang out with. Much better than last year when i knew only a few people. So hears my performance highlight list for this year. It reads pretty much like last year (scroll back to see)...

1. Zoe - Zoe's my favourite. Nuff said.
2. Unmata - They did a race car themed piece, which, was amazing. Makes me want to go home and work on choreography.
3. Tjarda (at the Friday afterparty) - by far the best flamenco-bellydance fusion I've seen, putting others (including TF teachers) to shame.
4. Colleena - I missed her fusion piece, but got to see her rajasthani piece with Patricia Passo's bata de cola. Fucking amazing. I've seen her fusion, Oddissi, but this was my favourite.
5. Asharah - Asharah has balls. Last year she did a very intense, aggressive piece which called for a lot of stage presence. This year she danced to a LIVE CELLIST. Never seen that before. I wish the sound was better, it didn't pick up the cello as well, but it was brilliant.
6. Damage Control/Bellydance Mafia (Choreo by Cera) - best, most innovative, intense choreography at TF. WTF are the rest of us doing? We needs to step that shit up.

Honorable mentions!!! Other dancers I really enjoyed this weekend were: Kitiera (great choreo, killer technique), Carolina (trumpet fusion???), Daniela (from Florida, saw her last year, great slinky smooth style), Martina and her group from Vancouver (i'm so tired of derivative bellydance, these guys didn't dance like everybody else, definitely ones to watch).

Hopefully I didn't miss anyone! Overall I think the performances were much better than last year. Or maybe I got better at averting my eyes to some onstage tragedies. In any case, It was a fantastic weekend.

Oh, and there's a video of me on youtube:

www.youtube.com/watch

I will not be performing at Tribal Fest.

So, the list is up and I am not one of the performers at Tribal Fest this year. I am completely heartbroken. I've been looking forward to this for a year, even more so when I decided that I would be moving back to Toronto in the summer. After everything that I've given up to try and make my mark on bellydancing, this was one of my last opportunities in SF. Mostly due to my financial situation, many other opportunities did not happen, but I was really counting on this one.

At this point I'm considering not going. It's probably temporary cuz i'm feeling like ass, but to be honest, my priority was to promote myself, not to take classes or look at stuff I can't afford. Considering that, I think I'm in need of an attitude adjustment. Either I enjoy every moment of bellydancing and stop being so fucking critical, or I get the fuck out. I'm really really tired of the materialism and popularity contest that is involved in breaking into bellydancing. If I could only do this full time, I have SO much to offer and so much potential, but at a certain point, one needs to cut their losses and try and find other dreams to chase.

I came, I saw, I locked.

Since January I've been taking locking classes at City Dance Studios in SF. I've been interested in learning how to lock for a few years now, but haven't really been able to figure it out. Bellydance always kinda took priority. But, I figured I'd sign up for the 10 week session, bite the $$$ bullet, and finally get my lock down. Thursday night we had our performance at the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco. I was really happy with how it went. Learning a new dance form is NOT easy, particularly when you're so comfortable with another form. Definitely makes you eat some humble pie! But I had a great time, the other dancers were great to work with and the teacher was one of the best I've had from the hip hop family of dances.

Oh. My. God. I am overwhelmed with gay...

How did I not hear about this???? I really need to talk to my gay best friend more...

www.logoonline.com/shows/dy...ies.jhtml

Its the gayest thing since Project Runway!! Eeeeeeeee!

Look familiar?

Yup, I'm the new face of Geisha Moth! Myself and the lovely ladies of Unmata modeled the 2009 GM wear for photographer Michael Baxter. So far only a few photos have been released, but there is more to come! There will also be a video of me in GM wear on youtube, I think in May coinciding with Tribal Fest.

I can't spill the beans on some of the new designs, but y'all are in for some treats! Let me just say what a pleasure it was to work with both Mothy and Michael. Both are total pros and know how to bring out the best in a girl! Mothy is also one of the hardest working people in the bellydance business. Not only does she crank out an astounding array of fantastic garb, she also takes great care of her customers (and models!), and donates to charity! Very very admirable.

Got Etsy??

I do!!!! Finally!!! Because I am TOTALLY not busy enough already, I've started to make stuff to sell...right now there's only a wine and black halter top and black and plaid frilly belts. All of these I've made for myself and liked them so much I figured someone else might want them too! Less than 3 will ever be made in these fabrics, so once they're gone, they're gone.

I will also be adding handknit opera gloves, I love SF capris, and my velvet frilly chaps. And maybe some vests. And some wool cloches. And maybe some other stuff.

www.etsy.com/shop.php

Tribal Fusion Faire video!

I finally uploaded my video from TFF. I gave up trying to find a functioning, free video editor for my mac (i don't have imovie). I was going to cut out the long intro (sorry). But they camera guys still fucked up and missed the first part of my piece. I do have another video, but you couldn't hear the music (again, I couldn't fix it). So this is as good as it gets!

www.youtube.com/watch

Celebrating 1 year in SF

I know this is a bit belated because my last post hasn't been in 6 months, and my anniversary in SF was on November 12th, BUT better late than never. I guess I should try and give a run down of everything that i've done in the past 6 months, but I will stick to the highlights.

- bellydancing at Opulent Temple at Burning Man. I never improvise but I was instructed to do a "semi-traditional" piece and had no time to choreograph it. I also forgot to pull out. Sooooooo, I winged it. I was pretty happy with the results (though i don't think i could watch a video) and apparently ppl thought it was choreo anyway.
- bellydancing at Love Fest in SF City Hall (where the photo is taken). Love Fest was great. It was gi-normous, I couldn't believe how many ppl were there. Mostly under 18, but still. The performance was on the grand staircase in city hall, which looked nice, but the sound was TERRIBLE. Kinda ruined the effect, but I at least I got this amazing photo (see above).
- dancing at Suhaila's Christmas Party.
- Tribal Fusion Faire. A smaller, more chill version of Tribal Fest. It was great, great, great. I got to meet bellydancers from around the world and got to hang out with some of my dance idols. Including, smoking while laying down in Amy Sigil's lap. I was beside myself. Laura (of Laura and Bonnie) called me the love child of Frederique and Kami Liddle. Which I am totally totally cool with. I also got to meet Melodia (who apparently lives in Marin now!) and Geisha Moth. I'll be posting my vid soon.

I'm totally totally inspired and encouraged by this past weekend and am looking forward to competing in the Breakthrough Fusion competition on Jan. 4th, as well as at Tribal Fest in May. It also looks like I'll be starting with Damage Control Dance Theater in February. Woohooo! I really needed this encouragement. The past year has been hard, with a lot of very intense ups and downs. There were many many times where I was about $10 away from having to move home. But, thanks to a few special people and my 5 jobs, I've managed to stay. Hip hip!

Oh, I look SLIGHTLY disheveled in the photo because the photographer took this LITERALLY 2 seconds after I got offstage.

Rosanna at Tribal Fest 2008 video

www.youtube.com/v/mqG-7DNB...e.com/watch