[bintbeled]

Originally Posted by Zana

Hi again. I checked on this ('cause a girl's got to break for lunch, right?) and the case reads "Saut Wa Soora 1214, Najwa & Suhair Zaki in Abu-Dabi."

Didn't have time to note down all the music, but here are the segments in order:

1. Stage performance by Nagwa in sleeveless lilac assuit with silver paillettes and big hair. Even the musicians have big hair -- the ones that have hair, anyway.
2. Stage performance by Soheir in the red assuit with short bell sleeves and giant gold paillettes. Nebtidi is the first song in this set.
3. Stage performance by Nagwa in one of her classic 70s bedlah costumes that from the front appears to consist mainly of legs, fringe, and hair. It's black and silver. She's wearing a headband that for me says "Charlie's Angels," for some reason.
All three of the above feature cane, as I recall.
4. Studio performance by Soheir on a set of circular risers. Extremely covetable assuit dress in a rich dark blue -- somebody find me one, please!
5. This is the weird one:
Nagwa in shiny, fringe-y red and a relatively restrained glossy bob is miniaturized and projected onto an ornate inlaid table behind which loom two seated singers. Male singer also plays oud and wears a tarbouche; female singer seems to be wearing a tiara. Tabletop Nagwa's size relative to the singers and the table changes throughout the clip, but she is shown on the table throughout. She dances a couple minutes of this segment on her knees, which I don't remember seeing her do elsewhere.

This brought up two OT-but-related questions for me, which I can re-post elsewhere if they're in the way here:

Does anyone know there are plans to re-release the Saut Wa Soora videos or the material from them on DVD? I remember hearing a couple of years ago that SWS had had to shut down because the pirates were bleeding them dry, but that's the last I knew (or thought I knew) of them.

Where does the idea come from that it's disrespectful not to wear a concealing slip or other base layer under an assuit dress? Is that incorrect? I've heard this from several instructors I consider very reliable, but Soheir at least certainly isn't wearing anything but a bra and panties under hers. I've noticed this in old movie clips as well. For me it's mostly academic -- I prefer not to show my legs much anyway because they're not especially pretty. But I would like to know if it is generally considered OK to wear, say, a plain red bra and straight red skirt under a red assuit dress or whether more coverage is advised.

Thanks, Zana! Obviously my friend didn't copy the whole video... but then again she knows that Nagwa was never one of my faves.

There are a lot of Saut wa Soora DVDs, BTW. I get mine from Bellydance Marketplace on eBay.