Dance Web

Review: Bellydance Superstars

The ’superstars’ themselves were individually mesmerising, true artists with perfect technique. There were dance sequences from Bollywood and Polynesia mixed with the more traditional Turkish and Egyptian dances. There were multi-coloured veils, giant golden fans, acrobatics and even a bellydancer on stilts. A veritable feast for the eyes.

While most of the dances were performed to taped music (not altogether successfully, at least at the start), live music was introduced in the shape of Issam, a master percussionist from Damascus.

and their conclusion?

A belly-wobbling 4.5 out of 5

you’ll have to register to see it, but…. if you do, you can see 10 years of dance in photographs, from a piece in the new york times magazine, here from photographer elinor carucci.

Wikimedia recently crossed the 100,000-article threshold, and that got my attention enough to see what they had about dance.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Dance

turns out, not a whole lot… so if you’ve got something to contribute, drop by.

in case you were interested in the opportunities that may have played into the delay of the us tour for the bellydance superstars… here’s a clue.

from the daily star (may 23, 2005): What a message. What a tribute

His present project is intriguing. Copeland will take a handful of Arab performers to New Mexico and film them while they perform for a U.S. audience. Sometimes they’ll be paired with American performers. “My brother [former Police drummer Stewart Copeland] is gonna get me musicians - Carlos Santana hopefully. The lead singer from Incubus is really interested in doing something.”

The camera will follow some through their American adventure. He will start filming sometime between November 2005 and January 2006. As the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is funding the two-hour documentary, it will broadcast on the U.S. public broadcasting network, PBS. Copeland then wants to distribute the film in the Middle East.

and he’s good… grant money for production and pbs money for distribution, and

“For me, since I put all these records out there, I’m sort of blatantly ‘Look, if I can get Arab music on the TV, I’m gonna sell a lot of records. Everybody’s gonna be happy.’ Underneath that there’s this subliminal message: ‘Wait a minute! These people aren’t just all terrorists. This is great stuff!’ When the movie comes the people will go ‘Well you know, Americans aren’t just ‘F**k you, let’s buy Macdonald’s. They like some of our stuff.’

let no one say he doesn’t take notes.

“It’s not an ethnic phenomenon,” he says. “It’s American women’ve adopted this art form as a way to empowerment, self-expression, ‘Be proud of your body whatever size and shape you are.’ Which is interesting because you have this impression of the Middle East as being suppressive of women. In America belly dance is an expression of women’s liberation. In a way.”

and a glimpse into the future

After making a number of small budget feature films, he migrated back to a music business in turmoil. “I tend to think in a broader spectrum now. I’ve got the belly dance show, which means we sell tickets, and we can clone it, in effect. There are five Riverdance troupes. Cirque du Soleil, god knows how many there are. Lord of the Dance, there’s four or five of them.

“So you can create a brand, then clone it. We’ve spun off with a very successful apparel line. We’re gonna be into perfume by the end of the year. Instructional CDs, DVDs, films. Then there’s the potential of advertising and sponsorships.

“These days … what with all the Internet piracy, the minute you create [a CD or DVD] the public has it for free. That’s just scary. We need to have more non-digital things. So I don’t look upon us anymore as a ‘record company.’ I think more as a manager, but because I own the belly dance project - I built it. It’s my idea - I feel more like a proprietor.

by the way, there are five fixed productions in the cirque du soleil tent, plus six touring companies.

from the tri-town transcript (boston area), Not your typical dance studio …

“I find this type of dance completely empowering,” said Suzanne Woodhouse, a student from Amesbury who has been studying under Iman for the past three years. “To learn the dance, you must find a place of strength inside yourself. You have to learn how to surrender and connect with the earth.”

Drop by the new calendar and let me know what you think…

…and don’t forget to get your upcoming events in here!

As part of this transition, you’ll notice that the “past events” are gone - there weren’t any comments attached, and while I generally don’t like breaking things that people may have linked to, I figured better to go ahead and do that now while the site is relatively small.

Just a quick congratulatory note to Sahara Dance and the hundred-ish dancers that survived Saturday’s marathon….

Great show, dancers… I hope you enjoyed it.

from the News-Leader, Concert connects with Middle East traditions:

“I want to establish a Middle Eastern connection with people who don’t have it,” Banaei says. “Americans can belly dance. That’s why it’s here.”

several pieces lately…

from This is Local London, Dance styles to fit everyone:

The troupe’s instructional and performance DVDs are already international best-sellers, and a new CD/DVD combo simply entitled Bellydance Superstars and The Desert Roses released last month looks set to follow that success.

from the Telegraph, I haven’t got the stomach for this:

That doesn’t sound very Arabian. Nor is it. For, despite exotic stage-names such as Petite Jamilla and Amar Gamal, the Bellydance Superstars are all, in fact, Americans, who chanced upon belly-dance at gym or dance classes before taking it up professionally. “We have Italian-Americans, CubanAmericans, African-Americans, everything except Arab-Americans,” says Miles Copeland, matter-of-factly. “I just can’t find an Arab.”

So he and his girls have spent two years - and half a million of his dollars - trekking round the world in search of success. The signs are good: Copeland is about to form a second company of Superstars.

One will perform a two-month residency in Monaco, while the other remains on the road. Despite being a multi-millionaire, he is still out every night, selling programmes and souvenir T-shirts from the merchandise stand. He even watches every performance, which he says he never bothered to do with Sting or, as Copeland calls him, “Stung, since he’s past tense.”

His dancers take up the theme. Rachel Brice leads the Superstars’ “tribal” group, whose costumes are much edgier. She has a gypsy-punk look, complete with porcupine quills and boar tusks in her hair, and a floral tattoo that winds enticingly from her lower belly over one hip to her backside. “There are so many levels to belly-dance,” Rachel says. “It’s great if you’re into performance, fitness, costume, make-up, anything.”

“Or just if you’re into good-looking women,” I suggest.

She stares pointedly. “That’s my least favourite element. That’s one of the reasons I like to perform a little strangely. It takes that whole ‘Yeah baby!’ thing away. It puts a bit of fear into the audience.”

and from ic north wales, Bellydancers take the world by storm:

Its authentic Arabic music and dance extravaganza has been a total out-ofthe-box success for the troupe and music business legend, Miles Copeland, their manager and founder.

and some thoughts from me… the age range “between 21 and 38″ is strongly emphasized in this bunch of articles. miles and his quotes and comments are still very prominent, as is the comparison to riverdance.

An exploration of Persian architecture

http://www.etereaestudios.com/docs_html/isfahan_htm/isfahan_index.htm