I would have happily resurrected it for this year's showcase, D18, but two of the four dancers are no longer available, and it's the sort of piece where the patterns and cascades of repeated movements only show up with more than a few dancers.
In preparing the relaunched classes, I was working with a couple of Natacha Atlas tracks, in case any dancers wanted to learn some choreography, potentially performing it at the Cardigan Belly Dance Festival, first weekend in August. I asked for a slot at D18 this year in the hope that the classes might take off, and had arranged additional rehearsal time for anyone wanting to perform something quick and simple. And if no one wanted to perform, then I could do a solo and hopefully attract some attention to my classes.
The dance showcase is over a weekend at the Torch Theatre in Milford Haven, with morning workshops and afternoon shows. I skipped the Saturday (so much to do!) and I didn't go to the workshops (knees feeling fragile and complaining a bit after bouts of digging the garden), although I looked in on one where an agile man was apparently mimicking an insect travelling low across the floor. There is no way I could have attempted that! During lunch in the cafe I saw a tech whom I knew from summer school, and found that we were on the main stage! I've only danced in the studio theatre before now. That being the case, I thought I had better go up to the auditorium to wait for a slot where I could orient myself on the stage.
The show was a fairly casual affair, with music handed in a little before hand, no tech run and some flexibility in the running order, handled really very well by the compere and technical team - only one or two small glitches. There were college groups and groups for dancers with learning disabilities, young children, professionals - a real mix, but largely contemporary and street dance, some of it really beautiful and technically skilled, some just sheer fun. I loved it!
I'd decided on a semi-improvised piece with veil to Soleil d'Egypte, reasoning that my usual baladi improvisation might be a little inaccessible for some of the audience. (As it turned out, there were a couple of people in the audience who had done belly dance and would have got it!)
I'm increasingly finding it difficult to warm up sufficiently to dance my best at haflas and the like and this was no exception. I went into a back corridor and ran through a good five-minute warm up, before putting my belt on and slipping into the wings during the piece before mine.
Then it was time. I felt quite small on the big stage. I'd given my camera to a member of the audience who agreed to record my piece, but I forgot to explain the zoom, so looked quite small on the film too. The bright 'sunlight' lighting bleached out features, and the camera struggled with the contrast, but the pic below was one of the better moments, although most of it has been cropped out.
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| When you forget to explain the zoom function to the person kindly recording your piece with your camera ... |
And then it was over! People seemed to enjoy it and I had random compliments afterwards, as well as a couple of enquiries for class details. One woman came to chat and explained that she was just visiting, had done some belly dance but had given it up and since we were more or less the same size (actually, she's nothing like as rotund as I am!) she had some costume to send me. I gave her a business card with my address, and a few days later, a gorgeous green and gold Egyptian-style overskirt/belt arrived. I'm so very touched by her generosity.
As for the piece, I was originally thinking of a class choreography without veils, but after dancing with one, have changed my mind. Now I need people in class ...! Or am I going to be repeating this solo at the Cardigan Belly Dance Festival in August?
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