Thread: AmCab: of yesterday and today

Originally Posted by Azhia

I have personal difficulty doing anything the same for more than a certain period of time so my dancing is completely different now than it was when I first started but I'm happy to have been schooled early on in the style of dance of which you are now speaking (I don't feel like calling it anything but it's whatever we're discussing here!! how's that for a run-on sentence).

I am so appreciative of the education because the way it was taught to me emphasized a dancer's ability to do everything, as Zamora has mentioned; being a well-rounded dancer who got jobs meant you had to learn how to play finger cymbals, come in wrapped in a veil, know how to remove that veil and work with it gracefully, do floor work, work with various props, do a drum solo, know how to interact with the audience, and work the finale, not to mention, know that music.

And the live band with whom I performed subsequently for about 9 years reinforced that style and the 3- to 7-part routine because they played all of that great music (Turkish, Persian, Arab, Armenian, Lebanese, Egyptian). The musicians always appreciate when you know the songs they are playing. People would think you rehearsed with the band but it was just a matter of knowing the music because you knew when the breaks and accents were.

A dancer in NJ, Alia Saleem, is a wonderful proponent of this style of dancing in our area (I'm still saying "our area"! haha...Philly is still home I guess).

So while I may not dance this way anymore or wear the same costumes, I will select my routines based on this format, modifying it a bit, depending on the client and event, etc.

There is a place for everyone in this whole range of styles available today. It is good to remember how things had been done before and that many modern dancers choose to employ this as their standard in 2008.

The music is another key component. Back then we only danced to LIVE music. It was all improvisation. People would always be amazed when I told them that we just danced to whatever the band played. Rarely were there rehearsals and we certainly didn't do any choreograph.

I'm with you, Dunyah. "AmCab" makes me wince.

Originally Posted by dunyah

Vintage Orientale or even Vintage American Belly Dance sounds so much better than AmCab. <sighs wistfully> PLEASE don't call it AmCab..w.:

This is am interesting question. I teach my students how to recognize and stylistically adapt to a Persian 6/8, a Moroccan 6/8, an Indian 7, Saidi 4/4, 3 different kinds of 9/8....

Originally Posted by casbahdance

Good stuff, everybody! Thank you!

How about meters? Are students of [American] Vintage Orientale (formerly known as AmCab ) still getting taught 6/8 and 9/8 in classes?

Deborah

I started in '77. I agree Shira... definitely a lean towards Turkish Oriental even as you see it today, ... but I also see/saw a strong Ghawazee component wayyyyy back... maybe because that was who a dancer looking while on site would be likely to see?

Originally Posted by *Shira*

Sedonia, speaking as someone who started belly dancing in 1981, I have to say that the names Samia Gamal, Aida Nour, Naima Akef, and others were never mentioned in my classes. The style of belly dance that we were taught more closely resembled Turkish Oriental than anything Egyptian.

Egyptian style started to influence us over the course of the 1980's, as dancers traveled to Egypt, saw the performers, and came home wanting to copy what they had seen there. Also in the 1980's we first started seeing some home videos of Egyptian dancers - but that too was a new influence. At this time, a lot of dancers abandoned the based-on-Turkish style that we had learned and moved in an increasingly Egyptian direction. I saw a lot of things change over the 1980's and then start to stabilize in the 1990's.

Originally Posted by liying

Guess life wasn't easy on me leaving home at 18 1/2 and moving to a complete total different environment!

I have an autobiography written on Shimmy Bliss website, but it was far too long and so personal.

Working as a secretary for an Iranian boss was not fun for seven years either.
He was a tryant and also doing belly grams was not an easy thing for the people I worked around either. I would have an engagement at 5:00 and get dressed in our bathroom and would cover up with a long coat trying not to hide the fact I was going to perform.

My love was belly dancing at 23 years old, making costumes, teaching and just loving the art of Middle Eastern Dance! When I received money for my dancing, it no longer was my passion any more!

Guess that's enough for now and loved to go to the Bhuz groups to learn and try to absorb a lot of stuff written to pass it on to my students.

Welcome abord! I personally love to hear all different views of BD as I am a baby belly and want to hear it all! Thank you for sharing your years of experience!

This is one of the few dance forms you can do really well improvisationally, and in the last 6 years of playing live music for dancers it has gotten to where we play the same Arabic music over and over. Nobody wants to even TRY dancing to a gorgeous Armenian song or a juicy Turkish 9/8... most of the local "pros" where I live actually couldn't do it. If it ain't Alf Leyla Wa Leyla (read that as "the dancer has to know every last note of the music") they aren't even going to try.
THAT I find a real difference over the years.... no DESIRE to try live music. And that can be such an intimate and exquisite interaction between dancer and band....

Originally Posted by norma

The music is another key component. Back then we only danced to LIVE music. It was all improvisation. People would always be amazed when I told them that we just danced to whatever the band played. Rarely were there rehearsals and we certainly didn't do any choreograph.

This is similar to how we danced in Greetown in the 80's.
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 02
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 03
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 04
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 06
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 05

Thanks for the crusing of Piper. Funny thing is that I have a spiral bound book that Piper's mother Rheas wrote from many many years ago. It's on my bedroom headboard.

I love the style of Piper and the way her mom taught her.

i think live music somewhat formed us as dancers.if you worked at a place that played one style of music, you seemed to frm a base on that.the use of steps is differant with differant instruments, songs....
i dance very diff with hye music than i do when with arab tunes.

Originally Posted by liying

Thanks for the crusing of Piper. Funny thing is that I have a spiral bound book that Piper's mother Rheas wrote from many many years ago. It's on my bedroom headboard.

I love the style of Piper and the way her mom taught her.

That's the "lineage!" My teacher's teacher was Rhea.

Originally Posted by norma

This is similar to how we danced in Greetown in the 80's.
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 02
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 03
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 04
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 06
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 05

Thanks Norma -- those clips brought back a lot of great dance memories.

Originally Posted by bhuzsaqra

This is one of the few dance forms you can do really well improvisationally, and in the last 6 years of playing live music for dancers it has gotten to where we play the same Arabic music over and over. Nobody wants to even TRY dancing to a gorgeous Armenian song or a juicy Turkish 9/8... most of the local "pros" where I live actually couldn't do it. If it ain't Alf Leyla Wa Leyla (read that as "the dancer has to know every last note of the music") they aren't even going to try.

Well, but conversely, would a 1970's American dancer have wanted to dance to Alf Leila? Would they have been good at it? Isn't this just reflective of what type of music and dance is popular (Egyptian), not on the prevalence of improvisational skills?

THAT I find a real difference over the years.... no DESIRE to try live music. And that can be such an intimate and exquisite interaction between dancer and band....

This is not my experience as a relative new comer. I would love to dance to live music but THERE IS NONE! At least where I live.

I love to improv, and I'd love to dance to live music too! I hope to eventually be located somewhere that this is still available.

Thank you Norma, these are gorgeous clips. Do you know what instrument was being played in the first clip? Its sounds like a guitar?

Originally Posted by norma

This is similar to how we danced in Greetown in the 80's.
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 02
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 03
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 04
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 06
YouTube - USS Saratoga CV-60 1984-87 Cruise-Athens Greece Port Call 05

Originally Posted by ssipes

Well, but conversely, would a 1970's American dancer have wanted to dance to Alf Leila? Would they have been good at it? Isn't this just reflective of what type of music and dance is popular (Egyptian), not on the prevalence of improvisational skills?



This is not my experience as a relative new comer. I would love to dance to live music but THERE IS NONE! At least where I live.

Well I didn't start in the 70's but I did start in 1980. Alf Leila? No we didn't dance to that. Alf Leila, and other Om Kalsoum classics and just classics in general were part of the "pregame show". As a dancer, I can remember sitting in the pre-show listening to the most awesome music that I wanted to dance to. Later on during the audience portion of the show people would be urging me to get up and dance and I'd be like "hey they already played the good stuff". But, the bottom line is the musicians picked and chosed the music they would play for a dancer based on her dancing abilitities. Very few dancers got to dance to Oum Khoulsoum music other than Lissa Fakir, Leilet Hob or Inta Omri which were pretty much standards in the Arabic clubs. Even though those were considered to be standards not every dancer was given the opportunity to dance to those classics-only the very talented and skilled.

Nowadays when I see someone dance to Alf Leyla for example, it is very, very highly choreographed. I've seen some extremely beautiful interpretations of that song. But back in the day, it was all improv. You had to have an instinctive knowledge of the music and a basic idea of the song because every night was a different night depending on who was playing or what mood the musicians/audience/and/or dancer was in.

Originally Posted by norma

But, the bottom line is the musicians picked and chosed the music they would play for a dancer based on her dancing abilitities.

Eew, that doesn't sound good at all.

Nowadays when I see someone dance to Alf Leyla for example, it is very, very highly choreographed. I've seen some extremely beautiful interpretations of that song. But back in the day, it was all improv. You had to have an instinctive knowledge of the music and a basic idea of the song because every night was a different night depending on who was playing or what mood the musicians/audience/and/or dancer was in.

Well, I dance to Oum songs and I don't tightly choreograph to those or anything else I dance to as a solo dancer. I use a choreographic structure but it is fluid and always changing.

I can see where working with bands would really enhance improvisational skills, but improv isn't dead and gone in these days of prerecorded music,r:;

THAT I find a real difference over the years.... no DESIRE to try live music. And that can be such an intimate and exquisite interaction between dancer and band....

I wonder, in all honesty, if it's fear. There seem to be a lot more dancers and a lot more expectations. Everyone's scared they'll Do It Wrong, whereas in the old days, there were certainly expectations, and the pro dancers were pro dancers, but they were all working a lot more in the dark, and there was a lot more flexibility from what I've read. There was a lot less worrying about whether the Ethnic Police were going to say "THAT'S not Egyptian", and also a lot less worrying about whether someone was going to secretly film your first experience with a live band and put it on YouTube for people to criticise.

Originally Posted by damariz

Thank you Norma, these are gorgeous clips. Do you know what instrument was being played in the first clip? Its sounds like a guitar?

That is a bouzoukee.

I think I agree with zum here. For many people, living in our modern 'everyone is a critic' world, it would be hard to deal with. Heck, it's hard for ME to deal with. I'd still do it, though, if given the chance!

Originally Posted by ssipes

Well, but conversely, would a 1970's American dancer have wanted to dance to Alf Leila? Would they have been good at it? Isn't this just reflective of what type of music and dance is popular (Egyptian), not on the prevalence of improvisational skills?

I agree with you, Sedonia.

I started dancing in the late 1970's, (my mom had started in the late 1960's), mostly to John Bilezikjian, Eddie "the Sheik" Kochak, George Abdo, plus a few others. John's music was heavy on the Turkish/Armenian with some Greek, while Eddie and George used alot of "Arabic" tunes. A few years later, Mom came home with more orchestral Egyptian-y music and, although I loved it, it took me awhile to figure out how to dance to it.

Different music makes a dancer dance differently. A Turkish 9/8 is certainly different from Alf Leila, and should be danced differently!

Also, as Zumarrad posted, "I wonder, in all honesty, if it's fear."

I was so ignorant when I started dancing that I never thought anyone choreographed a solo, so I had no fear of improv-ing. Live music, however, was scary, especially after my first -- disastrous -- encounter with live music in about 1977-78.

Now, I have the opportunity to dance to live music on a reasonably regular basis, which is really a gift for me and for all of us in Southern California.

We can't get good at something if we don't give it a try!

Deborah