Thread: getting down with the Balkan sound

Curious: how does one dance to stuff like Balkan Beat Box? What does one wear?

I have heard of tribal dancers performing to (or with) them, but I have never seen it. Do you know of any good examples?

I guess it depends on where you are dancing to it? i have slipped in rowdy Balkan-ish songs into my restaurant sets: Cigra, Esma Esma, Le Sexy & just rocked out. People respond to the fun you are having & the lively accordions & violins. I suppose you might not look the business dancing in a sleek Sahar? I tend to wear flared pants with my bedleh for the kinds of gigs I have these days so I can do anything I feel like;)

Endless wave pants.

I've seen mostly tribal perform to BBB but the music pulls from such a diverse range why limit yourself? Its the kind of music that just lets your imagination go wild.... could see it being blended with flamenco, turkish, Indian all kinds of stuff.

Hip hop fusion
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A34guAAQVDM]YouTube - Raqs Steady Eddie- Hip Hop Fusion Belly Dance @ Alauda #4 at the Skylark Cafe[/ame]

Tribal fusion
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5PafrYiR34]YouTube - Elysium: Adir Adirim[/ame]

i dont know anything about bbb...but chalga music is lots of fun. my boyfriend is bulgarian and a lot of the chalga music is danceable. kinda turkish sounding with good beats

YouTube - Broadcast Yourself.

Ya know, I'm not Tribal and I'm fusion only 'cause I'm old-school AmCab, but I've danced to BBB. There's one song-can't remember offhand which-that's a fabulous 9/8. I dressed in something from the wardrobe-probably the Sharif top/skirt-and went to town. The friend that introduced me to it worked it in all-out cabaret.

I'm not letting the Tribals have all the fun! (oh, they can use my stuff, too! I'm feeling generous..g.:)

If you dance more old-school Turkish and Vintage Oriental, Balkan music is an obvious choice: Bulgaria and Macedonia were a part of the Ottoman empire, and if one talks about Romani music, then the culural and political borders are anyways a bit of a different story.

Oh man. Christina King just had us doing a stick routine to a Balkan beat in a workshop Saturday. It was outrageous, it was fun, it was outrageously fun!

Slight thread hijack-it's occurred to me (and others, I think!) that what's become known as 'generic bellydance' now has lost most of its Turkish/Romani influence and is mostly American Egyptian. The Turkish/Rrom influence went to the Tribal side. Which leaves me between homes......c::

Following Kahaz somewhat OT: that memo must have gotten lost with all the junk mail in my house. I feel nicely at home in oriental-style belly dance with what I do, and I disagree that the Romani influence exclusively went and should ever exclusively go to tribal. I feel that it is an important influence on Vintage Oriental (or, as I like to think, just plain old belly dance). What we see seems more that the tribal world has discovered that Balkan music and Romani-style dancing is a heck of a lot of fun.

Now, I feel one should mention that Romani-style dancing is not really bellydance, it is a social/folkloric dance, which makes the inclusion of Romani stylings in bellydance a fusion. Which should of course be based on the serious study of what is fused.

Agreed! I've always said that as an AmCab dancer I dance fusion! And that the component parts make the whole interesting. It's kind of like doing a figure eight without knowing how to do a hip slide or twist-it may be a figure-8, but it won't be a GOOD figure-8.

Interesting,yes those dancers that use Balkan music in later years here in Scandinavia are fusion dancers.


...sorry...I can´t help myself:

Feruz the King,I LOVE FERUZ!
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdHW9lGLdcE&feature=related]YouTube - Serbian Folk music/dance, Ferus Mustafov - Milino kolo[/ame]

...

Weeeee Emma! I love King Ferus too :)!

I went to this concert (which was awesome OMG, the best i have seen!!!)
...and there was some dancing. it is not a lot you can see in this video but maybe something can inspire you? You might be able to find other videos from the same band where the dancing is more in focus... anyway...
I give you the incredible Fanfare Ciocarlia featuring Mega-macho-charmer Jony Iliev!
enjoy
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yOiEjjWYJc&feature=related]YouTube - Jony Iliev 'mig mig' + THE GYPSY QUEENS & KINGS[/ame]

Love it. Thanks for the clips and suggestions.

The Toids are another fun Balkan influenced sound. I love their Tsiftitelli song.

Originally Posted by gisela

Weeeee Emma! I love King Ferus too :)!

High five

I have albanian "roots" but grew up in Sweden listening to balkan music;however I don´t have any "ethnic competence" to dance to this kind of music-I just shake my shoulders,stomp my feet and tip the musicians.
Love to see more clips with dance to Balkan music in this thread!

I´ve heard there is a dancer in the US called Paula that dance Macedonian Roma,does it sound familiar for the US Bhuzzers?


More modern tallava music(ignore the "pimp style" video)with songs that Balkan live bands often play(with acoustic instruments):
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpvg6M1esR4]YouTube - ®DANGERam - M'ka Lind Nona Per Tallava Fatmir Emrin Mu Ma La[/ame]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRH7L5Cr5Ko]YouTube - Muharrem Ahmeti - Italia Me Kaxha - TALLAVA - www.besfort.de[/ame]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D49XGEC6MNc&feature=PlayList&p=C6810109C3C 31422&index=29]YouTube - Fazlija - Ciganska svadba[/ame]


More traditional style köcec with Feruz and Goran Bregovic:
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ax16J2wDk5w&feature=related]YouTube - Ferus Svekrvin Cocek[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HurHtBAydHQ&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HurHtBAydHQ&feature=related[/ame]

Originally Posted by emma-bessa

High five

I have albanian "roots" but grew up in Sweden listening to balkan music;however I don´t have any "ethnic competence" to dance to this kind of music-I just shake my shoulders,stomp my feet and tip the musicians.
Love to see more clips with dance to Balkan music in this thread!

I´ve heard there is a dancer in the US called Paula that dance Macedonian Roma,does it sound familiar for the US Bhuzzers?

I think the dancer you're referring to is Paola Blanton. She does Roma and Balkan dancing.
I've enjoyed balkan music for a while but never knew how to dance until this past weekend I attended Spring Fest, took a workshop in Macedonian folk dance also balkan Roma dance. It was mostly line dancing, although the Roma dancer taught the small group of bellydancers a few moves from a woman's dance. It was a fabulous experience! I think my fave part was when we did a bit of rom style karsilama.
The line dancing we were doing was kind of like this, some of the footwork was challenging!! I'm not used to it though. Would like to practice.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyBAV5Rj7ZE]YouTube - Makedonska Gajda, Romani folk dance[/ame]



[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTQ8pHXGxi0&feature=related]YouTube - Troiro, Greek folk dance[/ame]

Thank you so much-Paolas YouTube clips are great!

YouTube - paolayallabina's Channel



My dad lived in Skopje for a while,love macedonian music:)

The move where the dancers to the right are leaning and almost laying down on the floor and deep knee bends are also used a lot in albanian traditional dancing:
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgNVU3nFlyY]YouTube - Albanian folk dance - Valle nga Korça[/ame]

Originally Posted by emma-bessa

Thank you so much-Paolas YouTube clips are great!

YouTube - paolayallabina's Channel


]

Paola Blanton is doing a workshop here in town in May! W00t!

Originally Posted by emma-bessa

Thank you so much-Paolas YouTube clips are great!

YouTube - paolayallabina's Channel



My dad lived in Skopje for a while,love macedonian music:)

The move where the dancers to the right are leaning and almost laying down on the floor and deep knee bends are also used a lot in albanian traditional dancing:
YouTube - Albanian folk dance - Valle nga Korça

I'm glad you mentioned this leaning/bending move I was wondering what that was all about.... thanks!

Originally Posted by emma-bessa

YouTube - Fazlija - Ciganska svadba

Since I'm from Croatia, I adore all kind of Balkan music, from gypsy to pop! But can't belly dance on most of these songs, it would be weird for most of our audience ..c::
This last song you posted is pop and has so funny lyrics ..l;, It's name is Ciganska svadba which means Gypsy wedding, and he sings about his 15 year old son getting married; kids got in loved because gypsies are passionate, says he wants wine for 100 days that half of Balkan remembers gypsy wedding... and so on...

Here is some music I really really like:

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXs5cotq8RU]YouTube - Esma Redzepova - Caje Sukarije[/ame]
This is Esma Redzepova, queen of gypsy music.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUemki2QWWw]YouTube - Siki, Siki Baba[/ame]
This one is Shiki shiki Baba , you'll love it! I've seen one tribal fusion performance on it, that was great!

Search Kocani orkestar (gypsy brass band from Macedonia) in youtube and you'll find plenty of great Balkan music! Once I was at concert of Kocani orkestar, I met a girl from Florida, she asked me who are they, I told her it was a gypsy brass band and she asked me: "What? Like a DJ?" , after all, she didn't even know who are gypsies ..c::

Oh I LOVE Ezma!Her new collaboration with Ras Tweed rocks:
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2aDYAfA_plQ]YouTube - KIRIL feat Ras Tweed & Esma-Raise Up Your Hand[/ame]

Great that we turned out to be many "balkan babe bhuzzers"<3

A dancer in my troupe is croatian,and I get many good music tips from her.
And my serbian friend Milena introduced me to guca music-so cool!
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQwTENoppUE]YouTube - Serbia In Your Pocket - Gu�a Trumpet Madness[/ame]