BELLYDANCE CENTRAL - Everything Belly Dance! Welcome to BHUZ - Biggest Online BellyDance Community - View Single Post - Hossam Ramzy's Bedouin Tribal DVD review (brief)

aziyade · 11-02-2007, 12:17 PM

(Review is broken into 3 parts cause it's long. This is part two)

I'd start with the SLOW speed first, because that's where Serena explains the step and breaks it down. The slow speed instructional is slowed down to about half of the normal speed. This section is NOT taught to music.

The first step and its 2 variations are simply stylistic variations on something most of us call the 3/4 shimmy on the down, or the Haggalah shimmy. I'm not 100% clear with the difference is between the first version presented and the B variation, other than one seems to have the characteristic twist forward and the other doesn't. ??? That seems consistent with what I've learned from other instructors, but I might be missing some nuances.

A couple of the "steps" taught are really short combinations of steps. Nothing too difficult, but they move quickly. Another step just about killed me -- they're sort of a single hip circle with a snap, and you do them lowering yourself the ground. It seems like they're performed at lightning speed, and I can't get to ground with NEAR enough grace as Serena. Start working those quads, ladies!

The instruction, like I said, assumes you know certain things already, but I was surprised at how confused I got trying to figure out even just the first step from her description. Once I realized it was what I learned as a 3/4 shimmy down, it was easier to adapt their descriptions. If you get the dvd and get hung up on the first step, switch to variation B and see if that makes more sense. Then you should be able to figure out the diff between 1 and 1b. I don't think there were really any other steps that were that confusing, but it always seemed to help to also watch the variation step and compare them.

The full speed / normal speed instruction is really more a demonstration, since she doesn't talk through it, but the steps are put to music and you can see why she chose certain steps to illustrate certain sections of the music. Plus, on the slow speed section she will say things like "we do this to introduce this instrument" or "We do this to transition to the singer" -- and it makes no sense until you see it put to music.

11-02-2007, 12:17 PM	#10
aziyade Advanced BHUZzer Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: United States Posts: 1,822	part two (Review is broken into 3 parts cause it's long. This is part two) I'd start with the SLOW speed first, because that's where Serena explains the step and breaks it down. The slow speed instructional is slowed down to about half of the normal speed. This section is NOT taught to music. The first step and its 2 variations are simply stylistic variations on something most of us call the 3/4 shimmy on the down, or the Haggalah shimmy. I'm not 100% clear with the difference is between the first version presented and the B variation, other than one seems to have the characteristic twist forward and the other doesn't. ??? That seems consistent with what I've learned from other instructors, but I might be missing some nuances. A couple of the "steps" taught are really short combinations of steps. Nothing too difficult, but they move quickly. Another step just about killed me -- they're sort of a single hip circle with a snap, and you do them lowering yourself the ground. It seems like they're performed at lightning speed, and I can't get to ground with NEAR enough grace as Serena. Start working those quads, ladies! The instruction, like I said, assumes you know certain things already, but I was surprised at how confused I got trying to figure out even just the first step from her description. Once I realized it was what I learned as a 3/4 shimmy down, it was easier to adapt their descriptions. If you get the dvd and get hung up on the first step, switch to variation B and see if that makes more sense. Then you should be able to figure out the diff between 1 and 1b. I don't think there were really any other steps that were that confusing, but it always seemed to help to also watch the variation step and compare them. The full speed / normal speed instruction is really more a demonstration, since she doesn't talk through it, but the steps are put to music and you can see why she chose certain steps to illustrate certain sections of the music. Plus, on the slow speed section she will say things like "we do this to introduce this instrument" or "We do this to transition to the singer" -- and it makes no sense until you see it put to music.