A student asked me this recently… Q. Do I have to play my zills for the whole song? And if I don’t, can I just stop and start wherever I want? A. No, you don’t have to play your zills for any whole song – in fact, you may be overpowering the softer parts of your music if you do. This is especially important if you are playing with band and/or a singer. The music […]
We all have things we struggle to learn as dancers, for many it’s zills. They are challenging for sure in that “rub your belly, pat your head” kind of way. So many dancers seem to not play them these days that it just gets easier and easier for new dancers to justify passing them up like some optional prop. Heck, your instructor many not even play – so why should you bother? Investing the time […]
Recently, one of my students who is in both my weekly class and my student troupe mentioned that she felt she was “getting off easy” with the class choreography. I should first tell you that I have a remarkably hard-working student troupe that constantly reaches for a new challenge – and does it with gusto and smile. For this I am eternally grateful as a troupe leader. Her comment did get me thinking about how […]
Last weekend my student troupe and I performed our newest choreography, a multi-part Saidi, at our MECDA chapter’s annual festival. They were very excited about it and deserved to be – they worked on it diligently for months, aligning cane angles and synchronizing their spins. Their post-show glow took a rude hit in the dressing room unfortunately when another dancer approached them and said, “Your piece was…. interesting.” When she told me later my student […]
Early this year I attended an out-of-state weekend workshop to study Turkish Rom dance. After the final class, a group of us went out to restock our many burned calories. Our dinner party included the instructor and the sponsor in addition to a group of us students. Aside from being hungry, I was also there to work – specifically, to interview the instructor for Shimmy Magazine. After the meal and interview were wrapped up, the talk […]