Did you realize they were "famous?"

[Azhia]

Looking back upon when you were first exposed to the art and watched your first show...did you realize that who you were watching was or would be "famous"?

And/or have you had a "coming full circle" moment with said "famous" dancer?

SUHAILA SALIMPOUR
I was 11 years old, living in AZ at the time. My mom forced the whole family to go to a huge belly dance production at a resort hotel. Suhaila Salimpour was 17 years old and I saw her perform. I don't even remember what she looked like but I remember enjoying her numbers. Little did I know that 7 years later I would voraciously absorb everything in her "Suhaila 10 Dances" Tape and 15 years after THAT I would be studying with her for the next 3 years.

DELILAH (Seattle) + KHAJIRAH DJOUMANA
When I started studying this dance at age 17 I had a bellydance video that contained Raja's music (remember Raja?! OMG, what awesome music back in the day!) and several dancers, my favorite of which was Delilah, who I did not know at the time was an established dancer. I was captured by her light eyes, Am Cab style, and that thing she did with her hip that caused the fringe to go in these perfect circles!
17 years after, I was attending a tantra workshop in Maui with my then husband. He was wearing Lurainya & D'Lang's "My Girl's a Bellydancer" T-shirt and one of the vegetarian chefs noticed his T-shirt and mentioned there would be a bellydance show very close to where we were staying.
I didn't know till we got there that performing would be Delilah, as well as Khajirah Djoumana (who's style I like to call "happy tribal": all smiles, bright colours), who had relocated to Maui. Watching both was a real treat. It was amazing to me to see Delilah live b'c I had only seen her in videos. She was absolutely captivating! I dropped off a card to be given to Delilah thanking her for the inspiration she gave me to continue studying dance.

Side "small world" story: ALSO at that show, on the island of Maui, I spotted a dance student who I had just seen at one of my workshops (in Warminster, PA!) not weeks before, in the lobby. I confirmed it was her and we ended up sitting next to each other. What're the odds??

[jasani]

Delilah's amazing and she gives ALL of herself when she is dancing. I recommend taking a one-on-one with her because she is such a dynamic personality - she took my breath away when I had a private class with her. I think a lot of dancers got that tail swing from her. She tried to teach it to me but I could never get it because the way she teaches it is too demanding for me. Anyways, when I started in 1999 I found her website and ordered her three workshop tapes. I found an article on her website that she had been in a movie. I rented that movie just to see her in action. It was so cool to see a dancer from the 70's perform in a movie (for me anyway) and with Jane Fonda.

[leylalanty]

In 1977, soon after I first started dancing, I went to Egypt. I saw the pyramids, and other monuments in Cairo, Luxor, and Aswan. In Cairo, I stayed at the Cairo Sheraton where a "5-star bellydancer" (Nagwa Fu'ad) was performing. I went to her show twice and was enthralled. I managed to hire a guide to take me to the now closed and gone Sahara City nightclub where I saw Soheir Zaki and Hanan - again enthralled. I only found out they were famous top dancers after I got home and talked to a couple of Egyptians who told me about them! No, I didn't live in a cave - it was the late 70s - still pretty much the electronic dark ages.
No videos
No Arab films shown where I then lived in upstate New York
No internet
No DVDs
No CDs
No (or very few) commercially recorded cassettes
Want Arabic music? You may find 1 or 2 vinyl albums in your local record store's "international" section or mail order from Rashid's in Brooklyn, NY, without any chance to hear it until you got it.

[*Shira*]

My first exposure to both Delilah and Suzanna Del Vecchio was seeing them dance at Rakkasah. I had no idea either one was "famous" at the time, I was simply enthralled by what I saw. I especially remember Delilah's veil work and Suzanna's floor work.

[TediThomas]

I remember one seminar I went to as a baby dancer back in the early 80's (probably one of the first three I attended). It was with Suzanna Del Vecchio. Since seminars were still a relatively new experience for me, I had yet to establish any specific expectations (beyond the shopping). I remember all the noise, friendship and shopping during the registration period (everybody was focused on friends and shopping). Everything stopped/got real quiet. I turned around to find out what had created such an impact to cause the complete cessation of activity and noise. It was simply that Suzanna had walked in the door. Talk about being larger than life. I was so incredibly impressed with her projection of self and power - being able to command (politely too I might add) the undivided attention of a whole room of women focused on shopping. Absolutely amazing!

[jetgirl]

At the first Rakkasah I went to in the mid-nineties, Beata & Horacio performed. He pulled her out on a platform with a long piece of fabric - very theatrical. I was all about Fat Chance and Carolina; there wasn't much at Rakkasah then in the way of "Tribal"! I thought they were fun to watch, but I actually wasn't impressed enough with the dancing to want to learn Cabaret. I DID however see Morocco and Tarik without ever hearing about her before and thought she was tremendous.

Now if you have a thread about did you realize they would "become" famous... that I could go on all day about.

[SamiraShuruk]

I had been taking workshops and doing videos, but hadn't become obsessed yet when I first moved to the MD area. I didn't know who anybody was, I just knew I loved the dance. I was looking for a studio to rent to teach Pilates in and found Artemis Mourat. I had NO idea who she was - but started teaching Pilates at her home studio and became friends with this amazing, wonderful woman. Taking her classes brought my obsession into full bloom, which of course increased my dance education so then I knew not just how special she is as a person, but how special she is as a dancer, historian and educator and how important she is to the community.

[sumayasaahir]

I guess im a member of the Electronic age. I knew all the "it" dancers from Bhuz and the internet, and now even If I havent taken with them, I can still usually find a clip on youtube. And if it wasnt for youtube, I probably wouldnt know Soraya and Randa and a few Golden Era dancers as well. God bless Youtube.

[artemisia_danst]

that would be workshops with nelly mazloum when i was about 18.

other than that, not soo many famous dancers came this way. and most of the other international workshops teachers that dropped by belgium in that period, i did know about them by then, from magazines mostly, and a bit later the internet.

[Kashmir_LA]

It's interesting how many of us feel the same about Delilah. I saw her sometime in the mid-nineties here in LA at Cairo Carnival when it was still at Rio Hondo College. She danced with Sirrocco. All I knew was what my friend had told me about her, underlining her request with "IF you see one dancer all day - let it be Delilah". Im so glad I listened. She came out wearing sunglasses and did a beautiful dance to Suleyman's singing of "Minnie the Moocher" with Uncle Mafufo on dumbec. By the time she was done I had tears in my eyes just from the sheer beauty of their performance. I had NO idea she would be such a driving force in my dance life!! I've taken a couple of privates with her and I still cant do the Tailspin - its lovely though.

[tahiradancer]

Even though I "knew" Sahra was famous, I didn't really get it until I was at raqs B and someone asked me who I studied with. As I babbled away, I watched their eyes glaze over.

when they started to hyperventilate, I stopped and siad, I'm sorry, i should have told you. I'm from Southern California.

{{{HUGS}}}

[Monica]

At my first studio (Leea Aziz's Belly Dance!, where I studied for about seven years and later taught out of), we used to have guest teachers occasionally instruct the weekly intermediate and advanced classes, including Bert Balladine and Judeen. I knew they were awesome, but not famous. Oh, Kamaal sometimes, too. Bert was my teacher's teacher, and Judeen and Kamaal were former students of Leea's, so if the latter two were in town, or Bert was free and Leea needed to take a night off, that is who she would call. We were lucky, and most of us probably had no idea the caliber of instruction we were getting at our regular old classes, not to mention that these folks were so well known in the larger community.

On a related note, I also did not realize how lucky we were to work with such great musicians. Leea would put on four student nights a year with live music. We had local musicians play for us, but our local musicians just happened to be Susu Papmpanin, Reda Darwish, Mary Ellen Donald, Vince DelGado, Fadil and Nader Shahin, Mimi Spencer, Nazir Latouf...god, so many more. It was an amazing experience for a learning dancer (as I now know!).

[Azhia]

WOAH, Monica, WOAH. I just got black and blue from all those heavy hitters you mentioned!

[Monica]

Originally Posted by Azhia

WOAH, Monica, WOAH. I just got black and blue from all those heavy hitters you mentioned!

Yeah--definitely did not mean to name drop! It was timing and location luck. As I got more educated, realized there was a larger scene, started working regularly as a dancer, and met more people, I slowly realized how lucky we were, and I definitely cherish the relationships* I developed as a student and the experiences given to us by my teacher(s).


*okay, most of them anyway! :)

[Azhia]

No no no, it was aaaall good name dropping!

[elisagamal]

I had a bizarre moment the other night when I remembered that amir sofi once slept in my bed. :) he was in portland oregon for a while (around 1999) and hanging out with aziza. she came up to visit me and brought him along. they stayed over, and there you go. amir sofi, in my bed. I was not in it with him, by the way. lol!

[Azhia]

Originally Posted by elisagamal

I had a bizarre moment the other night when I remembered that amir sofi once slept in my bed. :) he was in portland oregon for a while (around 1999) and hanging out with aziza. she came up to visit me and brought him along. they stayed over, and there you go. amir sofi, in my bed. I was not in it with him, by the way. lol!

COOL!

[najla86]

I had a "didn't know they were famous" moment two years ago

I was looking for classes in NYC to take after work during the summer, and was deciding between two teachers who I'd found through bellydanceny.com....and the one I happened to pick, just based on reading these two teacher's websites, was Dalia Carella! that was some good dumb luck, and fantastic classes :)