So, if this is the case, why do we see similar things happening in belly dance so often?

Let’s replace the hypothetical situation above with a dancer and a top-of-the-line costume.  Just as the instrument does not make the musician, the costume does not make the dancer.  No matter how well a dancer costumes herself, a costume will not make up for a lack of training, strength, conditioning, flexibility, emotional expression, choreography, or technique.  A costume can not hide the absence of these essentials, and without these elements, the dance can easily become a fashion show.

Of course, a dancer’s costume must match her performance in theme and style.  It must fit her well and be made of good quality materials; it must allow her to move and express herself without restraining or distracting her.  As dancers we must look good on stage.  Dance is a visual art, and the costume is an essential part of the performance, whether it’s a classic beaded bedlah for oriental style, or coin bra and tassel belt for American Tribal Style, or a unique creation sewn by the dancer herself.  The costume is part of the experience, especially for theatrical performances.

But… if we spend more time worrying about costuming ourselves than we do actually in the studio or our dance rooms training, we hold back our beloved art.  No matter how good we look on stage, if we don’t have the movement to back it up, then the performance will fall short.  The costume is only one part of a complete performance.  There’s a reason that if someone says, “Well, she had a great costume”, it’s often because her performance was lackluster and her costume was the only thing that stood out.  A dancer’s costume shouldn’t upstage the dancer herself, and we should be spending more time and money on our training and the development of our choreographies than we do on our costuming.

Another way of putting this is: You can buy the best paint brushes, the finest oils, and the top-of-the-line canvas, but unless you practice your brushstrokes and actually learn how to use your materials, you won’t become a better painter.

If you take away your costume, can your choreography speak for itself, or are you relying on your costume to speak for you instead?

Opeth. Best known for being a Swedish death metal band who has had one foot firmly planted in the world of modern progressive rock for quite some time.   But their most recent album, Heritage, is not death metal. At all. And they didn’t play any songs with growling death metal vocals at their absolutely stunning live show here in San Francisco.  Heritage is a tribute to the bands’ influences, to metal and progressive rock of the 1970s, but with a personal, modern, and truly unique approach.  It blends classic heavy metal with quiet acoustic interludes and even a Swedish folk song played in a jazz style.

What makes Heritage so brilliant, though, really?

One:  It is not a hackneyed attempt to revive the musical trends of the past. It is a showcase of technical and emotional musicianship and a clear understanding of the music that paved the way for bands like Opeth to form and gain worldwide fame.  These five men are masters of their art, tip their hats to the past, and make emotional songs.  There is a fresh passion in their work, even as it references sounds from nearly 40 years ago…. and music even older than that in their reinventions of Swedish folk melodies.

Two: The lead singer makes no apologizes for any changes in the band’s musical style.  Ever.  In fact, he says that if someone doesn’t like it, they can fuck off.  Death metalheads lament the lack of RAWR in the recent album and tour setlist, but Opeth stands firmly by their creative decision to showcase more mellow and melodic songs from their already diverse repertoire.

Honor the past.  Know your roots. Be a master of your instrument (whether that’s your paintbrushes, your guitar, your words, or your body). Create honest art.  Stand by your creative decisions.

Wise lessons to live by, I’d say.

On the positive side of things, I feel like I am more observant, and I am less numb to potential inspiration.  My boyfriend and I took a trip down to Big Sur and back, and my gawd.  No wonder that place has been the destination of so many artists.  The redwoods are so beautiful, the coast line is awe-inspiring, and the hillsides are jaw-dropping.  How could one not feel inspired in the midst of such stunning nature?  What’s funny is that I have been on that drive before, but I was younger, and I had not yet moved away from California.  I took California scenery for granted, and it was just another part of my life.  After having been away for so long, I missed it to much.  I realized just how much magic this area of the world holds for me, and that’s one of the many reasons I decided to come home.

How could I have ever taken this for granted?  Silly me.

Morning Pages: The morning pages have been helpful in clearing out much of the gunk in my head, but they’re bringing out negativity.  As you go through TAW, you’re supposed to use these negative thoughts (which Julia Cameron calls “blurts”) and turn them into affirmations.  What’s difficult is facing the negative thoughts in the first place, but in order to find the light, we must journey through the dark.  Getting up in the morning is still a problem, especially when Fanty, one of my two half-Siamese cats, decides that as I am writing my MP that is the perfect time for him to snuggle with me in my lap.  After all, who doesn’t like morning snuggles?

Artist’s Date: I took myself out to lunch (in my Arabic program we have an hour and a half for lunch, which is just enough time to have a small adventure) to an absolutely amazing Indian restaurant with a fountain outside, a huge statue of dancing Shiva, and some of the most tasty Indian food I have ever had.  I wanted to slow down and really savor the flavors (unintentional rhyme!) of each dish.  I opened my ears to the sounds around me, the various conversations of people at nearby tables, the gurgling and splashing of the water in the fountain, and the din of dishes and flatwear.  On that day, the fog decided to melt away, and the sun shone brilliantly in Monterey; this is my favorite weather.  It doesn’t seem much to take oneself out to lunch, but doing so really helped fill my creative well.   I also discovered a cute little gift shop in which carries cards, knick-knacks, and jewelry, most of which I really liked.

I am certainly feeling that I am making creative and artistic progress.  It’s difficult to not feel inspired when I’m surrounded by beauty all the time.

I do want to encourage dancers to find Middle Eastern music that they like, even if it’s a few songs or just one style.

One of the things that came up in the responses to the last blog is the idea that dancers want to perform to music that is culturally more familiar to them than Middle Eastern music.  I completely understand.  BUT I want to add that one can become acclimated to, appreciate, and learn to understand music that is initially unfamiliar.  Chapter 8, “My Favorite Things: Why Do We Like the Music We Like” in Daniel Levitin’s amazing book This is Your Brain on Music speaks about this very concept.  I’d give you some excerpts here, but a friend is currently borrowing my copy.

I remember the first time I heard Venetian Snares’ crazy breakcore.  I was overwhelmed. I didn’t know how to listen to it.  But the more I listened to it, the more I appreciated it… and then I decided to dance to it.  I think one can do the same with Middle Eastern music.

Also, I am hardly a member of the “Ethnic Police”.  Seriously.  I dressed up as H.R. Giger’s Alien and danced to Autechre’s “Second Bad Vilbel”; how could I EVER say that one should only dance to Middle Eastern music?  I’d be a raging hypocrite!  I do, however, aim to educate.  Part of my job as an instructor is to bring up issues that might be uncomfortable, so that my students and readers can continue to learn and educate themselves.  There are so many dancers out there without mentors, and I strive to be a little beacon of light for those dancers who might not have someone of which to ask questions.

I hear this all the time.  Honestly, every time I hear it, my heart breaks a little.  It’s a bit like hearing, “I’m a ballerina, but I don’t like classical music.”  Or, “I’m a jazz dancer, but I don’t like Duke Ellington.”  You can be sure that a ballerina who hates classical music has learned to love it, or at least like it.  She’s going to be dancing to it nearly EVERY DAY.

Maybe this all-too-common sentiment makes me sad because I do love Middle Eastern music.  I admit that I don’t love all of it, but who loves everything in a particular genre or style of music?

But I wonder, why would you self-identify as a belly dancer if you don’t like dancing to Middle Eastern music?  It’s one thing to experiment with non-Middle Eastern music.  It’s another to eschew it completely from your performance repertoire or to say that you dislike all of it.  If you’re not dancing to Middle Eastern music, I really don’t think you can call yourself a belly dancer.  There.  I said it.

Belly dance is inherently Middle Eastern.  Whether it’s Turkish oryantal, Egyptian folkloric, Lebanese-style cabaret, Moroccan Shikhat: It’s all Middle Eastern.*  One might argue that belly dance as a genre is at a developmental crossroads, with Westernized belly dance being one branch of its evolution and Middle Eastern belly dance being the other branch.  I don’t think that we’re quite to that point, nor do I think that this argument (or any argument) is an excuse that allows for ignorance or dismissal of the historical and regional roots of this dance.

As Westerners (I’m an American, and many of my readers are also non-Middle Eastern), we are intuitively drawn to music from our own culture.  This makes complete sense.  (You all know that I’ve danced to crazy breakcore, arty electronica, and progressive rock–all of which are not at all Middle Eastern. But I’ve also danced to medieval Arabic muwashahat, Egyptian taqsasim, and drum solos)  We want to dance to music that moves us, and rightfully so.  We want to be able to give an honest performance to music that speaks to our hearts and souls.

I also think (and I do hear this quite a bit) that many of us are afraid that we won’t be able to do Middle Eastern music justice.  That somehow, because we’re not experts on how they dance “over there”, we’ll disrespect the music and the culture.  That we’ll misinterpret the song and do something offensive and uncouth. I know that I feel this way sometimes…  BUT: If you research the song’s meaning and history, and you go into your new choreography with awareness and understanding, you won’t be disrespecting the song or its mother culture.

I’ll recount a little anecdote from a Level III workshop I attended with Suhaila Salimpour a while back.  Before the workshop, we were required to create a work-in-progress choreography, using the feet and body placement only.  No belly dance moves, no hip work, no arms.  Just feet.  One incredibly talented student had completed the assignment using a French tango of sorts: slow, languid, and sexy.  Suhaila said, “OK, your choreography is lovely, but this isn’t Middle Eastern music.  The assignment was to choreograph to Middle Eastern music.”  She then asked this student, and the rest of the class, what sort of Middle Eastern music would have the same sentiment as this non-Middle Eastern piece that the student had selected.  Many of us answered that a nice chiftetelli would work, but then Suhaila said to the student, “Actually, while a chiftetelli would work, this needs to be a debke.  A really HOT debke.  Go find a debke song and come back tomorrow with the SAME choreography, but to the debke.”  The student was skeptical, but completed the assignment, performed the same choreography to the new song the next day, and DAMN if that wasn’t the HOTTEST fricking debke I had ever seen!  It was “Village Girls Gone Wild”, and it was astoundingly brilliant.

I learned a lot as I observed this dancer complete this assignment:

• You can use Middle Eastern music and put your own sentiment into it.
• The movements you put to Middle Eastern music don’t necessarily have to be what they do “over there”.
• You can learn to love the music if your choreography and emotional perspective are precise and clear.
• You won’t be disrespecting the music if you choreograph outside the traditional “box.” (In fact, you’ll probably be even more creative in the process!)

If we are to continue to call ourselves “belly dancers” we must absolutely know how to perform to Middle Eastern music, and… we must learn to love at least some of the music from that region of the world.  Chances are that we won’t love all of it, and that’s fine!  I admit that I just don’t love Arabic pop, and shaabi music just gets on my nerves.  I’m not a big fan of most of the “made for Egyptian bellydance” compositions (frankly, to me, they often lack emotion and start to sound all the same!).  But I love Umm Kalthoum.  I love a good drum solo.  I love a beautiful ‘ud taqsim.

If you all were my students, I would give you an assignment:

Find a song you like.  ANY song, regardless of regional origin.  Choreograph 16 counts of 8 (or equivalent) to that song. THEN find a Middle Eastern song that has a similar sentiment or feeling.  Take your choreography and set it into the Middle Eastern song without changing any of the steps.  Does it work?  What would you change?  What would you keep?  What did you learn in the process?

I am pretty sure that there will be a style of Middle Eastern music that will speak to you, too, but maybe you just haven’t found it yet.   Take the time to explore the many styles of the region’s music, and don’t limit yourself only to recordings that are labeled “Belly Dance”.  Middle Eastern music is more than just belly dance music.  It is rich, varied, and it can be hauntingly beautiful.  Saying, “I don’t like Middle Eastern music” is like saying, “I don’t like Western music.”  There is SO MUCH variety in one region’s musical landscape.  And if you find a song that does speak to you, and you dance to it from your heart, you won’t be disrespecting it or the culture.  I promise.  As non-Middle Easterners, we have to take some of our own culture with us into our choreographies and performances.  How could we not?  But we must also respect and research and honor the region’s history and arts.  And, I am absolutely not saying that you have to dance to Middle Eastern music all the time; but being able to enjoy doing so is something I hope that every belly dancer can and will do in the course of her creative journey.

*I like to include North Africa–Morocco, Tunisia, Libya, and Algeria–in with the Middle East region because of the similarity of customs, language, and culture.

As an instructor, I feel a great duty to my students.  For many of them, I am one of their first belly dance teachers. This means that their first impressions of belly dance from here on out are in my hands. I am responsible for their education.  I am responsible for showing them how to better take care of their bodies.  I am responsible for not only making sure they execute moves correctly and safely, but also for making sure they know when they’re performing a movement well.  I am responsible for critiquing them without damaging their self-esteem.  I am responsible for ensuring that they retain the information I give them, and for sharing that information in a way that is entertaining and memorable.  I am responsible for teaching them the history of belly dance (what we know of it), and that they know who has been influential in belly dance throughout the years.  I am responsible for introducing them to Middle Eastern music, for making sure they know the core instruments and sounds.  I am responsible for teaching them Middle Eastern rhythms.  I am responsible for teaching them basic music theory, how to count music, how to find the downbeat, and how to be a percussionist with finger cymbals.  I am responsible for giving my students the most accurate information I can about all aspects of this dance.

As an instructor, I must be an example.  An exemplar.  A model that my students can be proud to follow.  When I became a teacher, I didn’t realize I had all of these duties, but the more I teach, the more dedicated I feel towards the education of my students.

I teach because I love sharing knowledge.  I teach because I love that moment when a student finally executes a movement she’s been having trouble with for months.  I teach because I love the light in my students’ eyes when I tell them about the history of tribal belly dance.  I teach because I love seeing my students transform into more confident and self-assured human beings.  I teach because I believe there are things that students of belly dance should know.  I teach because I love it.  I know I don’t have all the answers, but if you have a question I can’t answer, I could probably direct you to someone who can answer you.

I believe all teachers have a great responsibility to their students, and not all teachers feel the same.  There are the teachers who teach because they want attention, they want to feel in control, they want to feel important, they want to boost their own egos.  There are teachers who feel like they should, but don’t necessarily love sharing information and knowledge with their students.  There are those who feel threatened by their own talented students.  There are those who cut down other dancers and teachers in front of their students.  These behaviors only hinder the development of newer dancers, setting poor examples for the belly dancers who will carry the torch when we have left the scene.  Thankfully, there are many instructors out there who understand that they are mentors and guides, and that the education of their students is in their hands.

I teach because I feel I have a duty to give my students the knowledge that I have collected, because if I don’t synthesize my knowledge and offer it, what good is it doing for me alone?

As a teacher, we all have a responsibility and duty to our students.  We must provide them with the best knowledge we have, and we also have a duty to continue our own training.  We must be humble, ever gathering more information not only for ourselves, but for our students.  As teachers, we are charged with handing down the legacy of this dance to our students.  For someday, some of our students will be teachers as well, and we need to make sure that their knowledge of this dance has a sound and solid foundation, and that we instill the love of learning and growth and training in them.

However…. While this seems harmless, it is doing the musicians whose music appears in these performances a huge disservice. These event producers aren’t licensing the music to which the dancers are performing. I’m not going to mince words here; it is illegal to sell a recording with music on it without having licensed the songs from either the record label or the artist him/herself. I have had to tell several event producers that when they sell a performance DVD to the audience members of their show that they are breaking the law. Most of the time, the producers are shocked. They honestly have no idea that what they are doing is illegal. Plus, the musicians whose music appears on these DVDs aren’t receiving any sort of compensation for their own art.

I’m surprised and frankly upset that event producers do not seem to know this simple fact.

Every time a belly dance DVD is made, whether it by the Bellydance Superstars or WorldDanceNewYork or the independent producer in her home studio, the music tracks that appear on those recordings are licensed to the tune of over $200 a song.

Please, if you are an event producer, do not sell DVDs of the performance to the general public without having licensed the music to which the performers are dancing. If you plan to sell a recording of the gala show, let the performers in the show know ahead of time not only that the show will be recorded but also that the general public will be able to purchase it so that we can inquire about licensing tracks so that the music can appear legally on the recording. If you plan to sell your show DVD to the public and you have all the performers’ explicit written permission to do so, plan to spend at least $200 a song to license each performer’s music. (Another pet peeve of mine is discovering the day of the show that my performance is being sold to the general public, even though in my contract it clearly states that producers must have explicit written permission from me to record my performance, let alone have it be available for any random person to purchase.)

This issue doesn’t just have to do with intellectual property laws; it’s a matter of respect. My art (or anyone else’s for that matter) is not public domain. Neither is the music to which I dance. It does nothing to elevate our dance form if we can’t even respect the other artists who inspire us.

Also, at the end of the day, we can say that money is just material, but applause and praise don’t pay the rent or buy the groceries. It is only just that every artist whose creations appear in a production get the payment and credit they are due.

Here we go.

Sometimes I feel like I’m just an intellectual in a dancer’s body. I love thinking about dance, blogging about it, conceptualizing it. I think that’s why I love teaching it.

And if people don’t want that, then I’ll find other ways to earn a living. I’m not compromising my dance just to get work. I just can’t.

The question struck me as odd… I didn’t know I had a “new” dance style as opposed to what I had been doing, but my dancing has changed quite a bit over the past year.

Dance is a physical manifestation of Self. I believe that the way someone dances is a complete and honest reflection of her unconscious, her shadow, her inner demons. If I have a student in my classes who lacks control over her movements, chances are that she’s feeling that her life is out of control as well. If another student has difficulty with fluid movements and is stiff, chances are that she’s feeling stiff or stuck in some other realm of her life outside of the dance studio.

Starting in 2004, I started to use a lot of electronica in my dance performances. For years I had been drawn to IDM (Intelligent Dance Music) and its related electronic music genres, even before I had started belly dancing. I didn’t think to truly combine my love of electronic music with belly dance until 2004. The robotic ticking, locking, and strobing that I used in my performances to (I think) best express the artificial and synthetic sounds of electronic music characterized the essence of my dance. As my visibility in the dance scene grew over the years, the music and accompanying robotic movements I used were (and still are) a hallmark of my own personal style.

Last year, my dance began to soften and return to its Middle Eastern roots. I’ve even been accused of becoming “too cabaret” by some. Not that a few distant voices are going to prevent me from dancing to music I love, from a region of the world that I have been drawn to since birth, and growing as an artist. But why have I changed?

Without getting into details, everything in my life shifted. I quit my job, which had been weighing on my shoulders for several years, making me feel incompetent and inadequate, and most of all, making me feel stuck in a machine in which I was merely a cog. Shortly after I quit my day job, my marriage disintegrated. When I found myself single again, I felt free. I had felt stuck in that situation as well. Both my job and my marriage made me feel like I was living an artificial life: one where I feigned happiness because I should have been happy, not because I truly was happy. I had a secure and well-paying career in a field that most people only dream of; I was married and owned a house. I should have been happy, but I wasn’t. I was not living authentically for my own Self.

In living an artificial life, it makes sense that I would dance like an artificial being, a robot, because that is how my essential Self felt. It felt stuck, inorganic, forced into a situation that wasn’t authentic.

I still love electronica; that isn’t changing any time soon. In fact, I’m listening to Lusine ICL’s beautiful album Condensed right now. But, I’m using less and less electronica in my performances. You’ll still see my “signature” ticking and precise technique, but it will have a different feel. I am not sorry if this disappoints you.

Art changes because we, the artists, change. My dance changes as I change. I am living a life in which I am much more true to myself, therefore, I believe my dancing has become less artificial-looking. I am no longer feeling artificial. I feel organic, alive, passionate, and real.

Life is too short to feel stuck in your art… and it’s too short to expect others to be stuck in their art as well.

When I was a figure skater, I entered local competitions in which boys and girls competed in the same categories, against each other.  It never failed that regardless of a boy’s skill, the judges would place him higher in the results than girls who were better skaters.  The judges wanted to encourage him, to make sure he didn’t quit skating, because there are often so few boy skaters and so many girls.  This phenomenon frustrated me.  And I think it would have frustrated me equally if the genders were reversed.  Skill is skill, regardless of gender, regardless of chromosomes (females having two X chromosomes and males having an X and a Y.  Other than that difference, male and female genetic make-up is fundamentally the same).  Why place someone higher in the results if they’re not actually worthy of that medal or if they have certain “bits” (as the Brits would say)?

Now, as a belly dancer, I’m seeing something similar.  We don’t have competitions in this dance (although sometimes I think mandatory competitions might be a good thing for this dance form, but I just don’t know how they’d be structured), so the question of “judgement” is left to the audience.  But it seems to me that male belly dancers, because of their rarity, are often put up on proverbial pedestals, with seas of screaming female audience members at their feet.  This is not to say that there aren’t male belly dancers who deserve such praise; Rashid from Bal Anat and John Compton of Hahbi’Ru being the first two who come to mind.

I think there are a few things at play.  (Again, I am not a gender studies specialist, and I know that many of you readers are more experienced in that field that I am, so please chime in.)

One is the encouragement of males in a female-dominated field.  Clearly, there just aren’t many men in belly dance right now.  It seems that we want to encourage the few men who do take a chance and try belly dance.  What’s wrong with that, you ask? My problem with this is that I feel like we should encourage anyone who wants to study this art form, regardless of chromosomes.  We shouldn’t be giving more praise and encouragement to one gender or kind of person over another.  It’s not just to give preference to one gender over another, not in belly dance, not in the workforce, not in art. Period.

The other is sexual repression on the part of the screaming women in the audience.  Have you seen the audience at a festival when a male belly dancer is performing?  I’m almost embarrassed for my gender at moments like these.  The screaming is so loud and fervent that it seems to verge on sexual abandon.  Maybe I’m sensitive, but I’m seeing this as akin to a group of men hooting and hollering at a female exotic dancer, telling her to “take it off”.  How would the women on stage feel if the men in the audience screamed with such abandon?  I have a feeling that many of the women would be offended, claiming, “this dance is an art and not for the sexual fulfillment of men!”  (We’ve all heard that line, yeah?)  Seriously.  Listen to the audience next time a male dancer is performing.  This is not to say that there’s anything wrong with sexuality or with male belly dancers, but take a moment, if you will, to reverse the roles. I’m just asking for a sense of awareness…. are you aware that the sentiment of the crowd changes when a human with an X and a Y chromosome takes the stage vice a human with two X chromosomes?  Or are you going along with the wave of excitement and screaming along without a moment of self-reflection?

Would you encourage that dancer the same way if he were a she? Or if she were a he?  Are you judging a dancer on his or her skills, not on the his or her gender, appearance, race, or ethnicity?  Are you aware of what your own personal evaluation of a dancer actually is?

I just want dancers to be evaluated on their skill, their presence, their technique, their emotional expression… not their gender.  Not their race.  Not their sexual orientation.  Not their ethnicity…  not their costume, not their music, not their gimmick.  Give me honesty. Give me dance. Give me art.