Sunday, August 28, 2005

Steps towards something beautiful

In a previous post I think I alluded to some beautiful, gorgeous, wonderful, amazing fabric that I've had sitting in my closet for about 5 years. It's been waiting to be a costume for quite some time, and I've been making plans for it during the last couple weeks. Today I had an opportunity to ask some dancers their opinions about how best to make a skirt to fit my vision, and now I feel fairly confident that I can finish it before school starts. Then I will be able do some work on the belt and bra here and there when I decide I have time for it - yay! I imagine the big push on this project will occur around Christmas time. Right now I have an idea for how I want the bra straps to go, but I'm not sure about the shape of the belt at all. The belt will probably be narrow, and will have to do up in the middle of the front or the back, because of how I want the fringe to hang from it. I want loopy fringe for this costume, similar to something like the below costumes on eBay. I already have a necklace pattern that is nice and loopy to match!

Tonight I found a website that teaches you how to make your own skirt pattern. It can be found here. This would be a starting point for me to adapt from. I'm not sure I want to put a zipper in the waistband (I've never sewn one in before), and if I do I might put it in the side instead of the back, just to make it easier to get into the costume. I have plans to put at least one triangular insert into the hemline to add fullness to the skirt in the back

This is an exciting step for me! Sometimes I'm too afraid of wrecking something really nice that I don't end up actually making anything. I feel well on my way now, though, so I don't think that's likely to happen.

How grammatically correct I am

Master!
You are a MASTER of the English language!


Huzzah. While your English is not exactly
perfect, you are still more grammatically
correct than just about every American. Others
admire the way you speak and could learn a lot
from listening to you. Still, there is always
room for improvement...


How grammatically correct are you? (Revised with answer key)
brought to you by Quizilla

Saturday, August 20, 2005

Gazal research begins

Well, I've just spent a little time looking into the meaning of Gazal, that song I so desperately want to dance to. Looking at the liner notes of the Essam Rashad CD containing this song, I see that Gazal is explained as "Poetic Song." I have heard of Ghazals before, but don't really know much about them. I decided to look it up in Wikipedia. The article there is pretty much impossible to comprehend, but there are a couple of wonderful links at the end. I totally recommend them to anyone interested in poetry.

The Ghazal: An Inevitable Unity by Jenny Burdge
That Bastard Ghazal by Andy Weaver

It's a little odd how Ghazal means literally "speaking with women" in Arabic, and means "
the last meloncholic cry of deer cornered by hunters" in Farsi and Urdu. I can't help but think that really says something about communication between the sexes!

It seems like such an interesting poetic form. It's sort of exciting to think of writing a poem that can have couplets so thematically different from one another. Is there a way to interpret this in dance form? Hmmmmmmmmm...

Friday, August 19, 2005

Brain Explosion

(Just to get this out of the way) Mmmmmmm, raspberry pie.

Now that that's over with . . .

I have had a lot of really good experiences lately. They weren't all happy, fun experiences, but I feel positively impacted by them.

Tonight I went to see the movie Sabah at the Broadway Theatre. It's a Canadian movie about an Arab-Canadian woman whose family became even more traditionally Muslim after they moved to Canada. Sabah turns 40 at the beginning of the movie and starts to take some risks. Some really wonderful changes happened in her life, and her family's as well. There was lots of belly dancing in it (along the line of Arab women's social dance, not belly dance club performances). There was dancing all through the end credits. It was really inspiring to see a woman take risks, and find love and a new identity and happiness. The movie was so good I almost cried! To read more about the story click here. It was interesting to see Roula Said mentioned in the credits. She was the belly dance instructor, wrote and performed some of the music, and acted as well. She is a singer in the group Doula.

Last weekend one of my favourite bands played at Lydia's - The Plaid Tongued Devils. They had a vehicle problem on Friday night, and we left at 1:00 and didn't get to see them perform. On Saturday a big bunch of friends went out and saw the show. It was a lot of fun. And a cute drunk guy hit on me all night! That was a treat! Usually I feel so invisible and uninteresting. It was really awesome to get some attention. We never hooked up (couldn't find him at the end of the night), but I like to think that somewhere out there in Saskatoon there's a guy talking about the hot girl he met at Lydia's, wondering if he'll ever see her again! Maybe this is a sign that non-drunk, young (as opposed to the drunk 40+ year olds who hit on me), cute guys could possibly be interested in me too. We'll have to see if I take any risks to meet someone new at the next show they play here . . .

A few weeks ago I went to watch DancEgypt perform at the Billy Tent (at Shakespeare on the Saskatchewan). Just as I was walking up to the tent and before I could see anything, I heard them playing one of my favourite songs, Gazal by Essam Rashad. For years I have been wanting to make a choreography to that song. It evokes so many strong emotions in me, and I think it could be a really powerful performance piece. In April I was telling my friend Debbie about this song, and how I had recently decided I probably wasn't a mature enough dancer to express what I wanted to with it. Fast forward to me walking up to the tent to see a much less experienced dancer performing to this song. My heart sank and I felt practically sick. I have been too intimidated by the song and the emotion of it all to even make this choreography, and here is someone dancing to my music!!! I can't even say if they danced well, because my attention was drawn so strongly inside of me. I've been thinking about this a lot ever since, contemplating what to do to make this happen. Some of the ideas I've had so far:
  • Contact a modern dance choreographer and get them to help me map out the feeling and rough stage positioning for the song. This would be a framework for me to build a choreography off of. I'm thinking of taking this step because I want this to be a very expressive piece, and I'd like to take it a step up from what I've done with previously choreographed work.
  • I've noticed that if I listen to the song over and over again, I sort of get paralyzed and can't plan. I was thinking that if I listened to the song once then videotaped myself dancing to it once, I would probably do some interesting interpretation while not being overwhelmed by it. Do this enough times over a couple of months and I would be sure to have several lovely moves ready to put into a choreography.
  • Give myself some time. If this is such an important piece of music for me, then the creative process deserves some time to be savoured. Initially I was thinking of performing this at Medicomania, but that only gives me a couple months. I think that's why I didn't work on it last year.

This choreography obsession has gotten me thinking of working on a dance costume I've also wanted to make for years. I have pretty much all the materials to make it, and in the last week or so I've bought more beads and a bra for it. The fabric has such beautiful colours in it, but it has a striped pattern in it. I think I would like some help designing and cutting out the skirt, because I haven't worked with fabric with such a large pattern in it before.

So, as you can see, my brain has been pretty much been wanting to explode for a while. At least it's out now, and didn't make a big mess everywhere.

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Selling . . . selling . . .

I've decided to sell some of my costuming and jewellery stuff. Here are some pictures of a necklace, bracelet, and earrings I would like to sell. I'm asking $15.

Ensemble
Necklace
Bracelet and pierced earrings

Thursday, August 11, 2005

Fringe Busking

So, my dance group is planning on busking again this weekend - Friday and Saturday evening. We'll be meeting near the Living Room at 7 pm, and will probably put on 2-3 half hour busking sets. I can't guarantee definite performance times, because that sort of depends on when everyone shows up, other street performers, etc.

Hope you can come see us!

Family Reunion Article

Here's an article about a family reunion near Westby, Wisconsin that I wasn't able to go to this year. I have been to at least 4 of the reunions from this branch of my family tree. (My mom's, mom's, dad's dad was Anton Benrud.)

Benrud Family Reunion: A family reunion like no other in the region

Thursday, August 04, 2005

The Fringe is coming! The Fringe is coming!

Another year, another Fringe festival. This year, as well as busking, my dance group will be back on the indoor stage (for the first time in a decade). We will be performing a half hour show in Venue 9, the Cosmo Senior Centre. Admission $3.

Our show times are:

Fri. Aug. 5, 9 pm
Sat. Aug. 6, 9 pm
Sun. Aug. 7, 7:30 pm
Wed. Aug. 10, 6 pm


Hope you can come!