I have been trying to motivate myself to begin my dancer’s
blog for a few months now and have put it off due to not knowing how to start.
I have always found in my studies that the title and the first line are always
the hardest part of an essay, very much like a dance!
However having just returned from Lorna of Cairo’s workshops
in Manchester crammed full of inspiration I feel that I MUST now start to my
blog just to share some of Lorna’s wisdom.
Firstly I must say a thank you to her for giving me a much
needed four hours of fun and being such an inspirational person. I feel blessed
to be a part of the belly dancing community in that I am always surrounded by
female role models that are courageous, strong, tremendously giving and follow
their hearts.
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Lorna’s second workshop:
Make it Masri – What is
that makes someone’s dance style ‘Egyptian’?
Lorna answered this question with the following answer:
What makes Egyptian dance Egyptian –> YOU
What a wake up call!
A bit of scary one to be honest! – no
chance of hiding behind those hip drops now.
Lorna emphasised the importance of not just stringing a few
moves together that we have seen someone else perform, nor should we attempt to
perform our repetitive class drills. Rather
she encouraged us to reach deep down inside and connect with the music, presenting
what we felt and appreciate the usefulness of utilising our own personality and
intuition. Most importantly she asked us to allow ourselves to be FREE. The
workshop reminded me that I need to be able to trust myself enough to let go of
fear for a little while and be free to be me.
I probably spend far
too many hours on you tube drooling over Randa, Dina, camellia, thinking oh I
wish I could be like then! Thank you Lorna for reminding me that I am not them,
that I have something unique to contribute to belly dance and that’s me, my emotions,
feelings and personal creative expression.
Lorna talked about how we uniquely express a song/piece of
music and she beautifully illustrated it by comparing dance to ‘language’. We all
learn the same words, the punctuation, the sounds, but how we piece it
together, how we express and speak the words is unique to us.
We are so used to ourselves speaking that it can be easy to
forget that our voice and the way we put words together and present them is unique.
Wouldn’t it be nice to also get used to dancing like ‘Rachel’
so that it becomes second nature just like talking?
It would certainly make improvising a lot easier, it I knew
what to expect of myself, could establish where my strengths lie and what I
wanted to get across and have the confidence just to give.
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The workshop has re-enforced my ‘dance aim’ for this year:
To explore dancing from my heart, not my head.
I have been taking a step back again to look at my own dancing
and get to know it better; really search who I am, what I have to give and try
to be more of myself in my dancing. It has been more of a challenge than I
thought but also rewarding in that I have been able to share and channel my
feelings creatively within a supportive and understanding community.
The next few blogs will look at several dances that I have
been working on this year and share my progress on being Rachel!
"Most importantly she asked us to allow ourselves to be FREE" - wonderful quote. It's the same with acting and writing. We are always trying to play a role whether it's a character, or the role of writer or dancer, sometimes we forget that what makes performance in any sense beautiful, unique and true is letting a bit of us go into it. I think letting a bit more "Rachel" into your dancing sounds like it would benefit not only the dance but you too.
ReplyDeleteWe do after all know ourselves and our abilities better than anything or anyone else, so we are our strongest tool creatively.
ReplyDeleteIt just takes courage to be able to give yourself and not fear others judgement.
Believe that just you is always good enough :)