Thread: Shimmy in this Nagua video

Watching this video and LOVE her shimmy... analyze it for me, looks like a forward pelvic tilt done really small...

http://youtu.be/KXSCN4ISeC0

and can someone tell me how to make the video show up in the post instead of just the link please?

looks like it might even be just a small bouncing shimmy with a really relaxed pelvis to allow for extra movement...

OMG! That was hawt! I don't know how she does that shimmy, but it's awesome. Also she does a "breast" shimmy, not shoulders. What a simple but genius performance.

click on the icon that looks like a filmstrip and insert the url in the pop up box:



I've heard a lot of ideas about how Nagua drives that front back shimmy, thigh rotation, small pelvic tilts, back driven, front driven, both...but I really don't know for sure. Looks cool though.

Originally Posted by jewelsdances

and can someone tell me how to make the video show up in the post instead of just the link please?

Personally, I prefer if people don't embed the video - otherwise the whole page takes ages to load and sometimes cuts out. If you want to see the video you can click it - you usually only want to do this once per thread - not every time you come back to it (and the worst is when people quote and include the embedded video!)

I can't tell for sure, but I think she's bending and straightening her knees slightly, only at the same time instead of alternating the knees the way it's usually taught, with a relaxed pelvis like someone else said.

OMG! I love her shimmy! One of the first clips of her I ever studied, was of her doing that shimmy.

If you watch very close, you will notice there is a certain dominance of her right hip. But she is a genius at keeping both hips at an even level.

My two cents here:

Soft pelvis - modified Egyptian leg shimmy with a more weighted "bounce" on the right leg. But keep control on the plane of the hips and how the movement energy is dispersed horizontally.

Maybe we should start a video thread of our personal interpretations on how to break down different shimmies

Soft knees, lift chest out of the way, power both glutes at the same time and allow the pelvis to tilt up and in with the squeeze and use the upper inner thigh muscles at the same time. The secret is in the quick release and recontraction, using only as much force needed to tilt the pelvis (pubic bone) half an inch in. The glutes will tire easiy as the blood has a hard time coming back into the muscles during a long pelvic shimmy. I have heard this called a Lebanese shimmy by some master teachers. It can be done while walking as well as stationary.

I want to guess it is a very small, repetitive version of the larger accents she does at 1:16, but I wouldn't rule out that it's just a bounce coming from the legs and the hips are loose. It looks to me like she's layering other little hip articulations (circles, front-back hip undulations) onto whatever it is and that's adding to the confusion. I'm pretty sure it isn't a variation of alternating legs like a modern Egyptian shimmy (no obvious up-down) or some kind of low-abdominal flutter (movement is too big and everything else is so relaxed).

Originally Posted by jewelsdances

and can someone tell me how to make the video show up in the post instead of just the link please?

You can also use the video tag and fill in the "XXXXXXXXXXX" with the 11-character YouTube ID.

[video=youtube;XXXXXXXXXXX]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXXXXXXXXXX[/video]

Originally Posted by kashmir

Personally, I prefer if people don't embed the video - otherwise the whole page takes ages to load and sometimes cuts out. If you want to see the video you can click it - you usually only want to do this once per thread - not every time you come back to it

I actually like the embedded videos, because it saves a click to tell if you've seen it already or not. It is a drag if you are on a slow connection, though.

(and the worst is when people quote and include the embedded video!)

I'll agree that unless you need to distinguish which of multiple videos in a thread you are referencing, it's better to edit it out of the quote, but that's true of images, too.

To me it looks like she is actually doing several shimmies. She's using subtle weight shifts to shift the hips, side to side, figure 8, and what we used to call a washing machine - a subtle twist with each hip being even. It also looks as if in addition to shimmying in all this different directions, she is adding some ab work. You can see it more clearly at 3:04.

It looks like a pelvic shimmy, nonstop, and at times layered with other movements, but I have no idea how she drives it.

On a related note, I had this idea in my mind around a year ago that I could get my pelvic shimmy to be as good as my "regular" shimmy, meaning if I just drill it enough I'd be able to do it nonstop without getting tired and without "losing" it, and to layer it with other movements without having to think about it.

I started practicing it daily, and then at some point I just sort of stopped. I think because, never having seen that done, I subconsciously started to think it was impossible, or just didn't have the right motivation for it.

Thank you for posting this clip. I have now, for the first time ever, seen someone do exactly that, almost nonstop for around 2 minutes. The impossible is possible. Now I have no excuse not to work on that.

Originally Posted by Zamira

I can't tell for sure, but I think she's bending and straightening her knees slightly, only at the same time instead of alternating the knees the way it's usually taught, with a relaxed pelvis like someone else said.

I tried doing this last night between shows in the dressing room... it's harder than it sounds! I never do a shimmy this way, so it'll be good for me to practice!

My pelvic shimmy doesn't come from the glutes (I can see how that could work, maybe, but it seems like it would be tiring) or the knees (although i sometimes switch to a knee bounce if I'm tired).

It comes from my hip flexors. I am working muscles from the tops of the thighs (those are lightly involved as well) through the hip crease and into the low belly.

I don't *think* she's bouncing at the knees because that shimmy (which Shereen El Safy characterizes as Lebanese and attributes to Nadia Gamal) would produce a slight level change, and Nagwa's head is very stable in this clip.

I've never done mine this small or for this long before though.... wow! I think I could, with some practice... *goes off to practice*

ETA: Oh! It's easy to get it that small if I hold just a small amount of tension in my abs. Guessing, since the abdominal muscles stabilize the pelvis while the hip flexors work, holding a light stability there limits the range of movement? There's a light tension in my inner thighs & glutes as well. It's not very tiring either... I think I could build up to two minutes in no time! *happy shimmy dance*

I've been watching that Nagua clip *very* closely (as in: nose to the screen ;)) for a while for teaching a 'stars of the sixties' workshop, and I've been able to create a very similar effect by focusing more on 'hinging' from the middle instead of tilting only the pelvis, as it allows for a more relaxed but still fast and tiny movement and easier layering. If you check how her dress moves in the clio you can see the movement sits a bit 'higher' than the pelvis, just above the belly button. I think.

I'm loving this discussion.

I would also like Fatme Serhan's costume, please.

Also: THIS! *glues face to screen again*

Originally Posted by Lauren_

My pelvic shimmy doesn't come from the glutes (I can see how that could work, maybe, but it seems like it would be tiring) or the knees (although i sometimes switch to a knee bounce if I'm tired).

It comes from my hip flexors. I am working muscles from the tops of the thighs (those are lightly involved as well) through the hip crease and into the low belly.

I would agree that this is the most comfortable and sustainable way of doing the move for me, too. Maybe with a lot more practice, I could get a long, even run of tiny pelvic drops/tucks, but using the thighs feels easier.

Just for the sake of argument, how close is Nagwa's shimmy to what MJ is doing around the 8:35 mark in "Thriller"? Same move but slower and harder, or different muscular generation? I'm thinking he's doing the tiny pelvic articulation style.

Michael Jackson - Thriller - YouTube

Originally Posted by jewelsdances

...and can someone tell me how to make the video show up in the post instead of just the link please?

Yup, hapenned to me a couple of time too! ????

OOPS! *edited* Thanks I didn't took the time to read the next posts, the answer was right there, duh!

Originally Posted by anala

Soft knees, lift chest out of the way, power both glutes at the same time and allow the pelvis to tilt up and in with the squeeze and use the upper inner thigh muscles at the same time. The secret is in the quick release and recontraction, using only as much force needed to tilt the pelvis (pubic bone) half an inch in. The glutes will tire easiy as the blood has a hard time coming back into the muscles during a long pelvic shimmy. I have heard this called a Lebanese shimmy by some master teachers. It can be done while walking as well as stationary.

Thank you for breaking that down for me -- I was staring at this clip on FB trying to figure out how she does it. I think Khalida may also have added some good tips on the "hinging" aspect of it, because I too noticed the lack of head movement.

Lots to practice!

(PS: thanks, Shems, for pointing me over here!)

Nagua, Mona Said and Shoo Shoo Amin all did this shimmy back then... I think Sahar Hamdi did as well.
Serpentine (Yasmin DC) worked with Shoo Soo Amin every night for a couple years (and Mona) and watched it up close and personal- she's got this one down pat and teaches it differently from how anyone has described it yet. Not to say that any thing is wrong... just that there are SO many different ways to look at something. Always new techniques to learn. :)
Her description, yes is a pelvic rock... but there are so many ways this can be taken. Some people will default to thrusting- using the glutes to generate the lower part of the pelvis forward. That's not happening or it would look lewd... and this doesn't look lewd at all. The way I understand it to be is the top of the pelvis tilts backward, lengthening the back, and then returns to neutral. Yasmin does it with back initiation.
The lower part of the pelvis remains relatively still. The head level remains relatively still because it's not an up/down with the legs shimmy. Shoo Shoo Amin can totally level change with this- which you can't do with the "trolly" shimmy.
I have to start to power this one with the "trolly" shimmy (up/down leg initiation), then add in the loose pelvis/back, then "catch the jiggle" and just do the back/top of pelvis.

Here's video of Shoo Shoo Amin
Shoo Shoo Amin - YouTube