In this video we are playing with lots of great belly dance isolations:
shoulder drops, pelvic pushes,
chest lifts & drops,
reverse ommis,
forward & reverse undulations
and chommis
and putting them all together in a challenging intermediate level technique drill.
All of this technique can also be found broken down in more details here on my YouTube channel if you would like additional explanation and drill practice.
Are you ready to challenge your body, your brain and strengthen your dance?
Let’s do it!
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Ready to take your dance to the next level? Join me for TEN FREE ON DEMAND CLASSES that will help you do just that:
http://SahiraBellyDances.com/JoinMe
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A huge thank you to Ms. Thea for her amazing music! You can find her albums online here: https://missthea.bandcamp.com
I’m so excited to share with you my newest acapella zill composition, created for the incredible Mojo Flow Online Dance Festival last month.
Since I knew this was going to be a recorded at-home performance I decided to play a little bit with the editing, and even figured out how to duet with myself to create more complex melodic ideas with the cymbals.
What do you think?
I used more than one pair of zill for this piece in order to take advantage of the incredible diversity of textures and tones available in this amazing instrument.
Can you guess how many different pairs of zills I’m using? Comment below and share your guess!
Enjoy!
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Want to learn to compose your own acapella zill symphonies? Start your adventure here with my free ZillStar Jumpstart course:
http://SahiraBellyDances.com/ZillStar
Already experienced with the finger cymbals and ready challenge yourself? Check out my exclusive zill membership course here: http://SahiraBellyDances.com/MoreZillicious
Are you a dancer who loves the idea of performing exciting and engaging dances with a beautiful belly dance prop?
Do you sometimes struggle with what to do with your arms within the dance and are looking for a way to strengthen your arm movements and expand the creativity of their pathways?
Are you ready to dive into a unique online hybrid learning experience that combines the best of on-demand video learning with the personal touch of live online classes to ensure you get what you need to succeed?
Join me for this “Fabulous Fan Veil” 5-week choreography intensive to get all of that and more as we flutter, flourish and turn through a beautiful and exciting fan veil choreography that is a spell-binding addition to any dancer’s repertoire.
SahiraBellyDances.com/FanVeil
This online real-time format is designed with the “flipped classroom” methodology being used in many top universities and institutes of learning. Within the course I will be offering the recorded content at the beginning of each week for you to work through and review as many times as you would like. At the end of each the week we will have a 45 minute live class on Zoom to work through questions and dance the material together. (Time to be decided based on all student’s availability).
The online real-time format also not only ensures that you will take the time to access and actually use the course you’ve purchased but it will also give you the opportunity to dive deeper with me by your side as you learn.
The end result? A new choreography that you’ve actually learned in just five weeks!
A fabulous dance adventure awaits you! Join today and begin your journey towards an exciting and joy filled dance life now!
Get ready to fly away with a beautiful fan veil combination!
Many dancers struggle with finding ways to creatively use their fan veils through an entire choreography (not to mention arm fatigue!)
In today’s video you will learn a beautiful fan veil combination from technique to finish, as well as gain an insight on how you can dance with this beautiful prop while keeping it closed, giving you the option for a dramatic opening moment later in your choreography.
We will explore gorgeous arm pathways and graceful ways you can dance WITH your fan veil, making it a beautiful extension of your body as you move.
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Are you a dancer who loves the idea of performing exciting and engaging dances with a beautiful belly dance prop?
Do you sometimes struggle with what to do with your arms within the dance and are looking for a way to strengthen your arm movements and expand the creativity of their pathways?
Are you ready to dive into a unique online hybrid learning experience that combines the best of on-demand video learning with the personal touch of live online classes to ensure you get what you need to succeed?
Join me for this “Fabulous Fan Veil” 5-week choreography intensive to get all of that and more as we flutter, flourish and turn through a beautiful and exciting fan veil choreography that is a spell-binding addition to any dancer’s repertoire.
Registration is open until April 12th: SahiraBellyDances.com/FanVeil
Get your special insiders club discount here: SahiraBellyDances.com/Discount
The fan veil is a gorgeous prop that many dancers incorporate into their routines. They bring a floaty, fluid and exciting element to the dance and are so much fun to work with.
In this video, I will give you four tips that will make huge impact on your belly dance fan veil work, making this exciting prop easier to work with and lending a polished edge to your dance.
Are you ready to level up your belly dancing? Join me today and receive 10 free classes to get you on your way to becoming a stronger, more graceful and joyful dancer!
We are specifically looking at the Egyptian shimmy as well as the differences between a three-quarter and a triplet shimmy, all of which are foundation movements in our belly dance vocabulary.
I am going to give you some crucial tips that helped me transform my shimmy into something reliable, comfortable and much easier to do!
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This clip is taken from a live shimmy class given in my Teachable Tribe Facebook group – a totally FREE group for anyone who is a member of my online belly dance studio at SahiraBellyDances.Teachable.com. Membership there is totally free as well!
Want in on the next class and access to the entire 45-minute replay of this class?
Head on over first to:
SahiraBellyDances.Teachable.com and get a free membership! While you are there grab your free online class sampler: “Belly Dance Bites”
and then join me on Facebook at:
SahiraBellyDances.com/TeachableTribe to get access to the entire 45 minute shimmy workshop!
Sure you love to play those beautiful shiny instruments at the end of your fingertips, but have you ever wondered exactly how they are made?
I recently sat down with the owners of Saroyan Mastercrafts (my all-time favorite zill manufacturer) and asked them to give us the scoop on how they make the instruments that we use to make the music.
In this interview they will give us an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at their workshop in California and walk us step by step through the process of creating their famous finger cymbals. We will also talk about their plans for Saroyan’s 50 year anniversary (wow!) and how they’ve been taking their magical musical instruments into brand new and exciting realms.
So join me for this incredibly special interview, and let’s learn how some of the best finger cymbals on the planet are made.
And if you are inspired to pick up a set (or two) of these amazing instruments after learning all about the manufacturing process, you can do that right here: SahiraBellyDances.com/SaroyanCymbals Tell them I sent you! 🙂
And if you liked this interview you will LOVE the Q&A session I had with one of the owners in my Facebook group “Zillicious” – a community dedicated to sharing the love of all things finger cymbals! She spent some time with us there to answer questions about caring for your zills, the environmental ins and outs of the manufacturing process and more! Join us there at : SahiraBellyDances.com/Zillicious
Today I’d like to share with you a zill lesson aimed to help you understand the beauty that is opened to us when we begin to use more than one sound with our zilling.
We’re diving into one of our most popular Arab rhythms used in belly dance, the Beladi. Literally meaning “of my country” it is more accurately named the Masmoudi Saghir (or small Masmoudi), especially when speaking to musicians of Arab descent.
While this was one of the first rhythms I was ever introduced to as a baby belly dancer two decades ago, I was not shown how to play it like a drummer until I started studying with musicians in the community, most notably Karim Nagi and Lauren Checchio. They taught me the importance of using a variety of sounds in my cymbals to create rhythms in order to actually be able to differentiate between rhythms in the dance.
So let’s learn to play the “Open Beladi” – this is the essential framework that makes the Beladi what it is and what is retained no matter how we move on to embellish it.
We’ll be using two zill strokes – The Basic and the Clack and working ambidextrously! ?
Are you ready? Let’s do it!
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Ready to dive in and learn to really rock your zills! I invite you to check out my FREE zill jump start course to get the foundations you need for great zill playing.
SahiraBellyDances.com/ZillStar
And if you’ve nailed the basics and are looking for the next part of your adventure, you’ll definitely want to join my signature zill course “More Zillicious Zills” an in-depth exploration of finger cymbals, advanced sounds, patterns, and musicality with zills!
In our quest for most robust and delicious zilling, we are always looking for new and unique sounds to add to our arsenal. Whether you are in the earlier stages of your zill adventure, or are a long-time player looking to expand your tool belt, using more than one sound on your cymbals is a huge ingredient to more expressive and satisfying zill work.
Within my practice, I have four core sounds:
The Basic – A hard attack of finger down to thumb zill that opens into a ring.
The Clack – A muffled chomp of both zills together.
The Ring – An edge to edge connection of the zillls that results in a clear ring.
The Tick – A muffled stroke using one zill perpendicular to the other.
You can learn them here: https://youtu.be/5blbtE5VVAI
(There are lots more great sounds where these came from… I consider these four to be the foundation of my zill toolkit.)
For years I have been teaching that fourth sound – the Tick – in a specific way : with the middle finger cymbal creating a little “hat” for the thumb cymbal and the two striking perfectly perpendicularly, with the rim of the thumb cymbal aiming towards the center of the other cymbals’ inner bell. This worked well for me.
Until it didn’t.
I recently bought a fabulous set of zills (the large Saroyan Grecians in silver) and discovered to my surprise that more than half of all my attempted Ticks came out more like Thuds.
What the heck?
This led me to do some investigation and this is what I discovered. If you’ve ever found yourself in a thuddy rut while trying to create a clean Tick sound, or are looking to find a way to create the Tick more quickly for complex zill patterns, you will definitely want to check this out.
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Are you able to create the Tick sounds with your finger cymbals both ways described in this video? Or does one work better for you?
If you are ready to take your zilling to the next level I invite you to join me for my online course: “More Zillicious Zills” – designed to take your zilling from basic to scintillating with interesting sounds, riffs, patterns, combinations and more. Become the confident zill star you were meant to be and join me here!
