The ATS Mixer

One thing I have heard about ATS, since my first class, was how once you know the common dance language you are able to dance with any other ATS dancers without ever having met them before. When Carolena reclaimed the term ATS a few years back that was one of the big points, having one common movement language for the style, so that it really could be performed by a group of technical strangers (united by their dance).

With this in mind, my troupe decided to put our money where our mouth is and host a mixer. So many of us spend our time in classes or performance prep, dancing with the same (lovely) people and working on the technical aspects of our dancing. The mixer is a relaxed, informal dance get together where we'll set up the space and music and you, the ATS dancers, come to dance and play together. Put that common movement vocabulary to good use and get moving with other ATS lovers, strangers and friends alike. We hope to make this a regular event, so locals please come out and support us!

The Electric Maid ATS Mixer
March 14th 3pm - 6pm
268 Carrol Street N.W.
Washington, DC 20012
(in Takoma Park)
suggested donation: $8

The Mixer is a low-key event for dancers to flex their improv muscles outside of
class or performance, in an intimate, sharing community arts venue. No pressure,
no recital, no judgement, no costumes. Dancers should come prepared to freely
improv with others based on their comfort level in American Tribal Style (ATS)
as established by Fat Chance Bellydance (FCBD).

Note about the dance space - bring dance shoes, the floor is a little rough. And don't forget to spring forward the night before so you're not late!

More details at www.kallistitribal.com

RSVP at the facebook event:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=463737400606&ref=mf

PS: if you throw in a non-ATS move we won't kick you out, we promise!

More on that wedding

One of my recent entries was about the wedding we danced at in October. Well our friends Christina and Jason are Offbeat Bride. Go over take a look at the gorgeous pictures of the ceremony and after party!

Live and In Person!

A video! This is from May, when we danced as the headliners at Charm City Tribal's quarterly event, which is a ton of fun and you will want to attend if you're in the area when one is happening, like in early November.

This is the first time we performed with the dueling duets and it was Flissy's first performance with the troupe; we asked her to join right after this. She did a beautiful job.

One funny thing you can't see from the angle is that when I'm behind Nora at one point we spin around and our skirts hook together. I had to do a quick reverse spin to unhook us. Note to self: only one person at a time gets to wear an Indian embroidered skirts with sequins, and also never wear them around someone with a lot of long chainette fringe or yarn belts.

Hafla Round Up

Yesterday was our 3rd Annual Kallisti Tribal Inappropriate Hafla. Third! Three years! It amazes me sometimes that our little troupe has been truckin' along since the beginning of 2006. The hafla was born out of the serendipitous meeting of our troupe with our Southern Maryland counterparts Troupe 'Hip'notic at the 2006 Tribal Pura show in DC. While backstage we bonded over our nervousness at dancing at the show, which lead talk of what we worked on in practices, and what other things we did in practices. The silly things. The inappropriate things. The dance things that, if done at a regular performance, would "get us kicked out of the local belly dance scene." And thus the Inappropriate Hafla was born.

This year's hafla ended up being wet; it started out with no rain, went to a misty rain thing, and then moved into a steady drizzle as the second act started. We did not despair, though! All the performers sat tight (under their umbrellas), waiting to dance and cheering each other on, and our non dancers stuck it out too. I told one performer, for whom this was her first time dancing outside of performances with her teacher, that after dancing in someone's back yard in the rain she could dance ANYWHERE.

We got to see dance offs, an amazingly silly cane dance, cheerleaders, a water gun fight, a burlesque fan dance, improv dance to a song picked by the dancer's Facebook friends, a slinky flapper-esque piece, and we had Troupe 'Hip'notic round things out with a hilarious "vicars and tarts" piece. We danced to Mika's "Lollipop", incorporating kids dances with some of our group improv and it was a LOT of fun. Not as epic as our multi-song mash up spoof of last year, but this one had some choreographed parts! I love the bio Lyra wrote for us:

Kallisti Tribal is a bellydance collective focused on pushing the boundaries of dance. Although originally brought together by a love of improv tribal bellydance, Amy, Brooke, Flissy and Nora are passionate about evolving their dance vocabulary and challenging the norms to achieve a new level of expression.

For this, their premiere Inappropriate Hafla dancing as a quartet, they sought out, searching far and wide for the biggest of all envelopes to push. They would not be satisfied with a mere A4 invitation sized dance envelope - no. They scoured their hearts and souls for, like, the biggest envelope you can imagine, ever. And lo, when they found it, they all got together and pushed as hard as they could.

By finding The Mighty Envelope and pushing it, they emerged with a regressive fusion that calls on their most innocent, most pure tribal roots. They're not just going to kick it old school, they went Older School, like pre school. No. Pre-pre school.

Kallisti Tribal......invites you to join.....
........ our TRIBAL..............
PLAYGROUND

If pictures pop up on Flickr I'll link to them.

ETA: Here is a video of about 1/2 of our performance. Flissy had to resync the music to the video, which is why the sound is not in "real time".

DC Tribal Cafe - this Sunday!

We're dancing this Sunday, June 28th, at DC Tribal Cafe: http://www.myspace.com/dctribalcafe

Unfortunately we're not sure who else is dancing, but we DO know it will be an awesome show because I don't think there has ever been a bad Tribal Cafe!

Here is some of the info, pulled from last month's show:

Let us enterain you!

Sit back and be entertained by cutting edge tribal fusion belly dance performances while enjoying Asylum's down-to-earth but oh so heavenly menu – full of the regular standard American fare and extensive vegan and vegetarian offerings.

With your tribal café admittance you get ½ price discount on burgers and $2 off select draft beer.

Sunday June 28, 2009

6pm – 9pm
Asylum Bar & Lounge
2471 18th Street, NW
Washington DC 20009

With the music of DJ MELLIE MEL in between dancer's sets! Doors at 6pm, performances start at 7pm – get there early for the best seats!

PICTURES and More info at: www.myspace.com/dctribalcafe
DCTribal Cafe sponsored by www.DCTribal.com
Asylum's awesome vegan and vegetarian menu can be found at www.asylumdc.com!
Questions? Email mavi@romkadance.com or check out our website at www.romkadance.com
Easy to access, paid parking is available 1/2 way down the block on 18th Street (on the same side as asylum)! There is another lot near the corner of 18th and Columbia in between the gas station and Adam's Mill Bar.


If you've never been to Tribal Cafe, it's set up as a pro, paying gig for tribal and fusion dancers in the DC area. Some tips for first timers - get there early to get a good seat. Also, bring small bills, as they put out tip cups for each performer (there are always three acts). If you're a pro tribal/fusion dancer in the DC/MD/VA area, check this event out. Dance there! Not from the area but passing through? Go see it! And maybe even see if you can dance there (special guests from out of town do perform on occasion!).

Getting the word out!

I want to take a moment to get the word out about some awesome events that are coming up in my area.

July 13-14 there are two amazing weekends of workshops going on, one in Baltimore and one in Philadelphia. First up is ReOrient: Artistic Perceptions of the Middle East.



This is being sponsored by my current teacher Shems and two other local dancers (I am proud to call my friends), Nina and Ariel. I am hoping to hit one workshop on Saturday, Aszmara's Stage Dynamics. I may miss the Sunday show, since I'll be out of town, but I am encouraging everyone to see it. Not only will the dancing be awesome but the Creative Alliance is a fantastic intimate venue.

The same weekend Hipnosis in Philadelphia is sponsoring Paulette Rees-Denis of Gypsy Caravan for two days of workshops.



I'll be traveling to Philly with my friend Flissy to take Day #2. After reading Paulette's book Tribal Vision I am really looking forward to meeting her in person!

Then, July 18-19, Mirage Trio of Westminster, MD is hosting Kassar (a tribal duo from New Jersey) and Ali (of n.o.madic tribal from New Orleans) for two days of workshops in Frederick, MD.




I had the pleasure to take a day of workshops with Ali last summer, and her teaching has been an huge inspiration to me. Two years ago I took (with Flissy) a duo choreography class with Kassar while at Tribeoriginal and it kicked my butt. Check out both workshops if you can, I'll be attending Day #2 (unfortunately being unemployed means I'm having to pick and choose my workshops very carefully, so I don't get to do it all).

Now, go forth and dance!

Best Intentions

I have two barely started posts I'm sitting on right now. I want to post, I really do! But right now I'm in the full on crunch to get ready for The Spoutwood Farm May Day Fairie Festival. This will be my 8th year volunteering at the festival, my 7th where I've camped and been there all weekend. On Saturday this year my SO will be playing with his group The Barrage Band Orchestra (he's on the left in the top left photo); I may sit in on repurposed-kick drum-duval, even though really? I have no idea how to drum. I watch the bass drummer and follow along. Or add some zills to the mix. Around playing I'll be running around being useful and catching up with friends I only get to see at the festival.

So I'm trying to finish costumes, cook, pull out the camping gear, do laundry, borrow my parent's SUV, and generally get my act together around trying to finish up some work for a project and (reminder to self) paying bills. When I'm back I'll make sure to get working on those posts, and I'm sure the festival will inspire lots of new thoughts.

TGIT (Thank God It's Tribal!)*

I wrote this for my regular blog, to amuse my friends and show them what things we go though as dancers. Of course I have to repost it here.

This past weekend our friend Cathy hosted Zafira for 2 days of workshops. It was incredible. I've taken workshops with Maria and Olivia twice before, at Triboriginal in 2006 and 2007, and even though some of the material this weekend was familiar I still walked away with so much new knowledge, so much inspiration, and so much of my a$$ being kicked (in a good way). I love them. Or lurve them. Or luff. With two effs.

Saturday night was the gala show. Cathy scored the Theatre Project, which I feel was (physically) an awesome venue, even with the tiny backstage (and tinier backstage restroom, which really makes you understand the term "water closet"). There were a lot of people in attendance, and though it was not a dance crowd (i.e. very quiet while you danced) they were very receptive and appreciative. Also, very patient and gracious with the sound mess ups. I'll get to that in a second, but first:

The good: Piper rocking her solo even with the horrible sound, getting to finally see Sammati from the audience (go zills!), Piper and students dancing with drums!, Levialora's beautiful basket dance with live music, Naimah showing us her softer side and endless shimmies, the huge group improv set with baby dancers to seasoned pros all dancing together even though most of us have never danced together before, Shems' glittering veil solo, getting to dance with Lyra and knowing that no matter what happens we've got each other's backs, Mavi being an incredible sword goddess, and Zafira working an amazing spectrum of dance from a saucy vaudeville number straight through to heart meltingly romantic belly dance.

Now, let me tell you about the crazy parts!

I have this part under a cut on my other blog, titled "You thought we would stop dancing, but you were wrong"

There were sound problems all through the show, starting with some of the CDs not working during the sound check. Piper's music from her CD was barely audible, full of static and the sound person cut it early, who knows why!! The crew didn't seem to understand that Zafira wanted their music to start and then took their time turning it up loud enough. Even though the sound guy said our CD worked, I ran for my iPod during the intermission, which was good because the CD of music for the large group set wasn't working and I thankfully had let the practice playlist on the pod. I didn't trust our CD to work, and I was worried even with the pod.

At first, despite the crew not understanding "Bring up the music and lights at the same time", it went well. But then, well, here's what was going on in my head:

First song done! Why are the lights going down? We have another song. It rocks! What? Okay, we'll stand here. And smile. Smile more. What is this! Okay, I'll start to taqsim just to do something. Hey, people are clapping, and it's a 4/4. We can dance to this! This is okay! Maybe the music will be fixed! Wait, this could go on forever. Thank you Mab for wrapping that up. Standing. Fine, I'll go up into the booth. *hike up skirts, run up the steps, pull up the exact song we need (the performance was single tracked)* "Don't hit play until I get down there!" *climb back to the floor* "Brooke, you go first!" Man, I am out of breath, but smile! Uh, why is our first song playing again? Okay, we'll dance to it! These poor people. I am so hot and sweaty. My arms hurt. Hi Brooke, look at us dancing! Hello people in the front row, are you tired of me yet? Okay, that's over. Pose, smile. Why are the lights going down! *scowling* Sound guy: "There's only one song", Me: "It's single tracked!" Suddenly! Our second song! Yeah! But it's too low. Make turn it up motions. Both of us yell: LOUDER! Hey, there it is! Me: Shimmy shimmy shimmy! Brooke: Shimmy shimmy shimmy! Both of us: dance dance dance dance. Totally rock the ending! Pose! Applause! Smile! Bow! Walk off. Sweat, gasp, gulp water.

So yeah, have I told you lately about the glamorous world of belly dance? On the other hand, improv rocks my world!

*Tribal group improv, that is

A Thing of Interest in Baltimore

On May 24th, local troupe Indra Lazul will start hostessing a weekly event at Latin Palace in Fell's Point. The event is 1001 Nights. My teacher Piper will be dancing the opening night.

There is another weekly ME night, Shanta at Red Maple. I'm not too keen on it (not my kind of bar/club, not crazy about their current policies regarding their dancers). Perhaps 1001 Nights will fullfill my desire to get out to dance for fun!