Desert Shakedown on Saturday!

Ok, let's take a break from angsting about change and focus on something fun! This weekend I will be performing at the Desert Shakedown in Tempe Arizona! I will be getting onstage at approximately 2:05pm for my solo performance, and I will also be joining Skirt Full of Fire/Fire & Gold for a group performance sometime later in the day (around 5pm I think).

This will be my first time performing at Shakedown as a soloist, and also my first time not vending. I am looking forward to not being tied down to a booth, so I can wander around as much as I want, shop, spend time with my friends and troupemates, leave for food, watch performances, and generally relax when I am not on stage or getting ready to dance.

Slump... or not?

So, after telling the trolls of the world that they couldn't stop me from dancing, I spent the past week not really dancing. I mean, I went to class and troupe practice like a good li'l troupe member, but I have not been dancing at home. I could try to blame it on a variety of reasons -- it's too hot in this house, I hurt my arm, Chris left a table in the middle of the living room floor, I had to write a million things this week -- but mainly it is that I am still feeling incredibly uninspired.

But those are all just excuses. No matter what, I could have at least carved a little space out of my living room and done some drills and then taken a shower to cool off. The truth is I haven't felt like dancing, not emotionally anyway, so I didn't dance. Every single day I would say to myself "I should practice today" and every single day I would grab onto every excuse not to. I even considered skipping class!

Today I broke free of the excuses and danced. I wanted to work on my Open Stage solo and on the solo I am going to audition for an upcoming Plaza show. Well, ok, I didn't WANT to work on them (I wanted to sit here looking at much prettier, better dancers on Pinterest), but I knew that if I didn't I would have no one but myself to blame when I looked like a dope on stage tonight and made an awful audition video.

So I put on my music and I started dancing, and I surprised myself. I felt connected to my music. Timing that I had been struggling with in my audition piece suddenly snapped into place. I feel really, really good about the practice I just had. I expected it to feel forced and awkward, but instead it felt inspired.

I need to remember times like this when I just do not feel like dancing. Maybe some days it won't be like this. But if the inspiration doesn't come, I can at least drill. There's no excuse for laziness. Life is too short to not practice.

Still kicking

I have really fallen off of the blogging wagon. Between my recent house-sitting adventures, my hatred of Blogger's new design, and the total lack of interaction from my readers (yeah, I said it!), I have not really felt a lot of enthusiasm for blogging lately. Don't worry, it's not just you guys, my jewelry blog hasn't been updated in over 3 weeks.

Anyway, I'm still keeping a really busy class and troupe practice schedule. I actually had to skip the second class tonight because I was just too worn out. Hopefully I'll sleep well tonight, because I really need to practice for my two upcoming shows. I've barely worked on my solo for the Open Stage on Thurs. Of course, I also haven't received confirmation that I have a spot in the show, so there's that.

In the meantime, I'm daydreaming about future solos, new costumes, and going to Tribal Fest next year. I have $40 in my Tribal Fest fund, hooray!

Dancin' with my fans

Tonight I debuted my glow fan solo to "Sydney" by Caravan Palace (a new favorite band). I was a bit nervous because I haven't practiced nearly enough, but I think it went pretty well! At the very least, the crowd at the Luxor Cafe enjoyed it, and I only dropped a fan once near the end, so it could have gone a lot worse. I'll have to watch the video and see how my angles and planes were.

I really enjoyed Open Stage tonight in general. There was a nice mix of dancers. Several of my fellow Fire & Gold troupe members performed the pieces they're working on for our big show next month. It was really exciting to see what they're all working on! I also got to hang out with my friend and occasional carpool buddy Cynthia, who I don't see often enough. All in all, a good night.

Class and Practice

My tattoo is healing nicely, so it's not slowing down my dancing. Hooray! Today I went to Jolie's community class, where we did a modified version of Monday's choreography, and lots of shimmies. I worked up a nice sweat!

This evening, I worked on the F&G choreo (getting better every day!) and the solos I'm going to present on Monday to possibly be used in our big show on May 20th. I have two pieces I'm working on, for a total of just under 7.5 minutes, with the idea that I can do either one, both, or neither depending on what we need.

I also made time for some stretching, because muscles need love, too!

Quiet Mood

I haven't really been in a networking/blogging sort of mood lately, honestly. I suppose I haven't really had any profound insights to share lately, and sometimes it feels like I'm just speaking into a void anyway. So here's a quick recap of the past few days:

Classes: Anaya classes on Thursday, went well, worked on some moves I already knew fairly well but could use the practice on. Really struggled with staying focused though, because my husband got home from a biz trip while I was at class and I wanted to be home with him instead of dancing. Anyway, on Saturday I tried out Jolie's community class, along with my friend Jen who was visiting from Tempe. We had a good time, got to do a mini-choreo that focused on various 8 shapes.

Shopping: Hey, it's gem show season! I went out shopping! I failed to find more tribal hair sticks, which made me sad. I did get a new belt and a long tassel made of smaller tassels, and another strand of coins, because I can never have too many coins. Also I bought a basket, because tribal girls carry their stuff in baskets and it was green! And two pairs of pants which can be worn for class or solos or fun, and they're also green. I even found a cool cover up and guess what? IT'S GREEN!

Solo: Working on a new solo to perform at the Open Dance on the 23rd. I may do Lovely Creature instead, but it's good to have something new to work on.

Family: My brother is now a performer, too! He's been doing fire spinning for a few years, and working as a fire safety for our local fire troupe, Elemental Artistry. He recently decided that it was time to try his hand at performing and on Friday he had his debut, doing rope dart. It was pretty badass and he didn't light his beard or the audience on fire. I'm such a proud big sister!

Dress Rehearsal

Day 350 of practice.

My new bra is done-ish (I may yet do more to it, but it's wearable now), so I had a quick dress rehearsal to make sure that everything would play nice together and that none of the embellishments would fly off my bra if I had a sudden shimmy attack. Everything seems great and I am extremely excited about my new costume and my solo, which is the closest I've ever come to choreographing something.

Tomorrow is the Plaza de Anaya student recital, so I should probably also practice my zills for that, as we have to do something a little new and different. I am surprisingly confident about playing zills on stage now, as long as I am not leading and zilling.

By the way... day 350! Only 15 days left in the year! Hard to believe.

I am a wuss

Day 347 of practice.

It was 45 degrees and pouring rain, so I wussed out and skipped class tonight. A big part of me regrets it because I love Jolie and her classes, but that studio is SO cold, and I can't risk getting sick from it. Not when I have two performances this weekend. My husband is sick and I am trying really hard not to catch what he has.

I put my time at home to good use -- I've gotten a lot of work done on my new bra, although I am going to have to stitch like a fiend to have it done in time for this weekend. I also ran my solo twice and experimented with doing some things differently. I realized that the part I was coming in at was almost a minute into the song, which is too much for a 4 minute song so I will come in earlier. Still forgetting to emote! It's such a new thing for me, and I am worried that my attempts to convey the sense of menace in the song will just come across as me being stone-faced or something. Oh well. No one is paying me for this so they can't complain if they don't like it ;)

I also did some shimmies while I was doing the dishes, partially to practice but mostly to stay warm. I hate winter!!!

See me dance this weekend!

I have two performances this coming weekend, so I hope I'll see at least some of you there!

On Saturday I will be performing at the Plaza de Anaya student recital in Tempe. From 5:30 to 6:30 there will be an open drum and dance, then at 7pm the students will take the stage! This event is free, and you can bring a dish if you want to participate in the potluck meal. I will be performing with the Anaya Tribal students. Click here for the Facebook event page, which has more details.

Then on Sunday I will be performing at the Belly Dance Holiday Show at Fluxx Productions here in Tucson! This hafla will feature visiting dancer Raven Ebner as well as many talented local Tucson dancers. I will be performing with my Wednesday night classmates and debuting my Lovely Creature solo. The event costs $5 and we will also be collecting non-perishables for the food bank. Doors open at 6pm. Click here for the Facebook event page.

This 'n' that.

Days 342 and 343 of practice.

I did practice yesterday, but it wasn't much and then I fell asleep before I could blog. I was feeling a little sick so I stayed home from class in case I was contagious.

Today I am still not sure if I am well or sick. I have that feeling that you feel when you have a cold coming -- just a little sore throat, just a little run down. But I've had it for two days. So maybe it's just the weather getting me down. So I decided to have a full-fledged practice anyway. Did some zills, did some shimmies, ran my solo TWICE because I have to perform it in 9 days :) Getting better with the moves but I keep forgetting to work on the emotion/character. Maybe I should put a note on my mirror to remind me.

Also today I signed up for the Amy Sigil workshops here in Tucson at the end of January. I'm excited for them!

What a difference a week makes

Day 339 of practice.

I don't know what happened... maybe I broke through a wall. Maybe I just needed some introspection. Maybe I was holding myself back. But whatever happened, tonight I felt frickin' awesome at Jolie's class. We did 2:16 of a relatively difficult choreography and while there were a couple of parts I was a little iffy on, over all I felt really comfortable with the non-bellydance elements and like I was on top of it, fully committing, and most of all having FUN even when I was really cold. I really really enjoyed myself and I feel like I danced at my potential and didn't let my mistakes keep me down.

And of course, part of the fun was that it was just Jolie, Fonda and I so it was a kind of relaxed, intimate atmosphere and Fonda and I were having fun joking around about alternate choreography and how we should do a Gothic Fusion Horror Circus piece. More and more adjectives kept piling on throughout the night.

I felt so good when I got home that I also did a quick run-through of my solo and played with some different moves and ideas. I'm starting to feel better about the possibility of performing this piece at the Holiday Belly Dance show here in Tucson on the 18th, although I need to work on the emotional part as well as the moves. I'm great at roleplaying, but I have no acting experience so I don't know how well I'm going to do at portraying different moods on my face. Plus there's the costuming... I want to buy lots of new bits for it and the budget just ain't there!

I am a lump

Day 333 of practice.

Today I gave into the urge to be a lump. I had a more lousy day and felt so bad mentally that I made myself feel bad physically, too. Even before today turned out to be worse than yesterday, I was feeling bad about my current state as a dancer. Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like I really have not improved noticeably at anything at all lately. I don't think I'm practicing often enough or hard enough, and I've reached the point where I'm not getting better just from being in class.

Jolie's classes have been both good and bad for me -- I love the material and I'm learning a lot of new stuff, but I'm also a perfectionist so it frustrates me when I can't do something. I'm feeling pretty down on myself because I'm not doing as well in her classes as I would like. For that matter, I also haven't been feeling too awesome in my various ITS classes. Lot of issues with not feeling graceful, being off the beat, etc etc.

I want to be awesome and amazing and right now I feel strongly mediocre. And hooray, I asked for the opportunity to perform a solo in just over 2 weeks. I'd better find some self esteem fast.

Oh, and today's practice? Working on said solo. It's the one that Jolie helped me get started on during our private lesson and I feel like I am not capable of achieving the awesome ideas we had for it (both when working together, and then the separate ideas I came up with after another listen), and like I am basically doing the same stupid moves over and over again with no real emotional investment. On top of that I drilled layers over tic-toc shimmies, because that should be simple but I suck at it. And I stretched, because stretching is good.

Made of Awesome

Day 320 of practice.

This week has been full of frustrations, so I'm happy to say that the dance-related areas of my life were pretty awesome today! First I had a private lesson with Jolie, and she helped me work on my next solo, using emotion and gesture like we learned in Monday's class. It was admittedly very strange having someone there while I started working on a solo -- usually even my husband doesn't see an in-progress solo until I'm pretty comfortable with it. But it was also cool to get feedback at the very start, so that I knew what direction to go in. I'm excited and I hope I get the chance to perform it soon -- but not too soon because I need time to work on it :)

Also, having a big mirror to dance in front of was pretty nice, although it feels a little narcissistic to be staring at myself while I dance. I'm sure I'll get used to it.

Then in the evening I finally made it back to Fonda's Dance Loft class, where we had a very special treat -- Friendly neighborhood drummer Carl was there to provide live music! He's going to be a regular fixture at classes for the near future, so we can learn more about dancing to live drumming and playing rhythms on our zills. We did a lot of zilling tonight which is great, I was feeling bad because I haven't practiced my zills since troupe rehearsal on Sunday. It was also so good to see my classmates again and be in the fun, relaxed atmosphere of Fonda's class.

I can tell that I'm starting to feel better, because after all of that, and even though I'm a little tired, I still feel like doing more dancing!

What a day!

Day 289 of practice.

Busy dance day today! Did a quick dress rehearsal for my solo, then got ready for the group piece, packed up my solo costume, went over to the location, waited for the show to start, danced 20 minutes with my fellow students, then had to quickly change into my solo costume (there were only two numbers between the group performance and my solo!), danced my solo, and then of course stayed for the rest of the show to see the other dancers and make lots of noise.

Now I'm really, really tired, but also very inspired! There were a lot of great performances tonight and I have so much to think about to make my next solo even better. But for now I want to kick back with some chocolate and tea and just relax, because I have a big week with lots of hours of dance class coming up!

Dancing... at home?

Day 287 of practice.

Lately it seems like I'm always in a class, workshop, or troupe practice. It felt weird to be home and have time to just dance, play around with new music and work on some solos. I think I'm going to dance to Convivio at the student performance this weekend, simply because I was so busy getting ready for the Shakedown that I never worked on a new solo. Of course now I have all these great ideas, but not enough time to really get to know a song and perform it with confidence.

But it is really, really tempting to perform to a Nick Cave song, just to keep up my trend of choosing unusual songs for Tucson performances :)

9 months!

Day 273 of practice.

9 months of daily practice under my jingly green belt! I bought myself a present yesterday, beautiful teal lace harem pants (swoooooon), and I let myself take it easy today because DANG am I tired! Went to bed at 1:30am and woke up at 4am, 6am, 8am, and 9am. That sort of bad sleep is not acceptable after 3 hours of dance class and three hours of driving to and from dance class.

Anyway, I am SUPER EXCITED about my dance future because starting next week I'll be taking classes with a new teacher! Not that my current teachers aren't awesome, but these classes will be more focused on technique and solo material, which I really want some formal education on. My solo stuff is really a combination of isolations, basic tribal moves, and crap I made up. I get lots of compliments on my solos, but I know it's mostly because of the energy/emotion of my pieces and the fact that people like the veil work I've been doing lately. I want to take it to the next step beyond that!

More later... Now I need to sleep, and I'd better not wake up repeatedly!

I'm a water faerie!

Days 260 and 261 of practice.

Here's a picture of my costume from yesterday's performance! I danced to "Ocean" by Collide, and my character for the piece was an amoral water faerie... Shy, seductive, alien, and graceful. Also she wears tiny winged bird skulls over her ears, because I've been waiting for the perfect excuse to wear them. I got a lot of compliments on the costume and the dancing, so I'm floating on Cloud 9.

Over all, the Healing Through Dance benefit was a success! All of the performances were great, we had an enthusiastic crowd, and we raised a nice amount of money for the Sessoms family! Speaking of raising money, we ended up with a lot more rummage sale donations than we expected, and Plaza de Anaya has kindly allowed us to leave a rack of items in the store, so if you were unable to make it to the benefit but would still like to shop, head over to the studio this week! There are some really nice items! I personally came home with a new tie top, gahwazee coat and panel skirt all in beautiful Autumn-appropriate colors. There are things for tribal, fusion, and cabaret dancers, and some clothes that can be worn for day-to-day stuff, too!

Today was troupe practice, where I got my brain broken by more zill patterns! I really need to work harder, and also get myself a private zill lesson with Mahin, because she is awesome and I need help. We also talked about upcoming gigs, costumes, and our dance levels. I am pleased to announce that I am now a Level 2 Anaya Tribe Dancer and I only need 1,000 more EXP before I level up (a little joke for my gamers there).

We have a troupe gig next weekend but it's for a charity event and I don't think it's open to the public, so if you want to see me get my group tribal improv on, you need to come to the Desert Shakedown on October 8th!

Work and Play

Day 256 of practice.

Tonight I worked on my solo, and my Anaya moves and tribal basics (I've been taking HUGE steps for Gahwazee again so I drilled taking little steps, for instance). But I also played around by hearing a random song on my iPod and wanting to get my dance on. I might just use it for my solo performance at our upcoming student show here in Tucson. It's fun and funky and it's NOT A VEIL SONG. I love veil, but I don't want to be typecast as "Sophia Ravenna, the girl who always does a veil solo at every hafla." Especially since there's a veil part in our student performance.

The other thing I did today was go shopping for supplies for a new dance bra. Yay! I bought a nice bra to use as my base -- dang, good bras are expensive! But if it's the only thing between my nipples and the audience, I want it to be good quality.

Getting down to business

Day 249 of practice.

No more Miss Lazy Dancer! I've been noticing over the past week that my midsection was getting a little squishier than I would like, the results of not practicing hard enough and eating out too often. This is unacceptable! I need to dance harder and eat healthier and be the best dancer I can be.

So tonight's practice consisted of a nice dynamic stretching warmup to get the blood flowing and everything all loosy-goosy.

Then I did the shimmy drills section from Serpentine with Rachel Brice, which built up a nice sweat and reminded me that my shimmies on the down suck.

Then I grabbed my Rajna CD, because somehow I've never listened to it, and I set out to do some improv. But the first song was only 2 minutes long, so I decided to do the second song too, and it was over 6 minutes long. So yay for over 8 minutes of improv to unfamiliar music! Boo for the fact that the second song had a lot of dulcimer or qanoon or some other vibrating instrument that required more shimmies.

Then I grabbed my veil and practiced my solo.

Then I came in here to update my blog and SaraBeth's comment on yesterday's post reminded me that I had not practiced my 3-3-7 zill pattern! So I spent a few minutes working on that and made some progress.

Now it's time to take a relaxing shower, and do some stretches so I don't wake up with sore abs tomorrow!

Good, good, bad.

Day 248 of practice.

Today's practice was broken up into three parts.

First part: Partial dress rehearsal for my upcoming solo. While digging around in my closets, I not only found a pretty blue silk scarf big enough to be used as a veil, but I also figured out my costume for the solo, too. So I put it on and danced in it, making sure that the veil was going to get along with the costume. I just wore the clothes, though. I need to decide on hair and jewelry and put all those on with it next time, to make sure nothing will catch on the veil or otherwise not work out. But so far, pretty successful!

Second part: Awesome local dancer Kamrah posted a challenge on her blog to do improv every day. Well, I already improv all the time so I decided to try the advanced challenge, which is to do improv to songs I've never heard before. Today I danced to "Aim for the Head" by Creature Feature -- yes, I did belly dance to a song about shooting ghouls. It was a whole lot of fun! But there was a part in the middle where it was just someone talking, and I had to just kind of pose and I found myself wishing that I had my sword or some other weapon to make me look badass. Of course, no one was watching, not even the cat, so it didn't really matter.

Third part: Zills. Ugh! Why am I having so much trouble with the 3-3-7? Anaya wants us to layer it over a Turkish, and I can fake it in class when I'm following the better zill players, but at home it turns into 3-3-what was that awful clatter? I'm going to have to work on it every. single. night. until I can do it on my own.