Making JLo proud since 1999 - Bellydancing to "Dance Again"

I decided to inject a bit of fun to the class by combining bellydance moves with modern jazz (I'm a jazz dancer by training, then shifted to bellydance when I injured my knee). I love JLo and I've used her music for some choreographies. My students learned this dance in one session - that's pretty good memory and focus for beginners.

Who's the Fairest Choreography

Another pop song - Who's the Fairest - by Shani. Fun, energetic, and easy to remember!

Alf Leila Wa Leila Choreography

I've always wanted to choreograph classic Egyptian music. I've always veered toward Turkish or Egyptian pop for my classes, mainly because it's easier to choreograph and easier for students to memorize. Pop is, well, predictable: 32 counts here, 32 counts there, chorus, rinse and repeat.

Classic Egyptian music is unpredictable. You don't know when the beat will change, when the instruments will come in, when it's going to speed up or slow down.

And that's exactly what makes it beautiful.

It might be difficult for my memory, but seeing it all come together makes it worth it.



Anyway, it's been a crazy month. With all the shows for Christmas parties, I am glad to have the time to update. I'll update more when I have a chance to grab pics. Until then :)

Waka Waka Choreography

I know, I know. The World Cup fever has died down like a month ago. But still, this is one fun dance. Shakira does another "dance-able-can't-stop-moving-to-the-beat" hit again.

Habibi Ya Eini and Tabel Ya Issam - Choreography

Another choreography completed by my lovely students. Two songs this time!

Bellydancing with KC Concepcion - July 1, 2010

So during my birthday, I got the rare treat to do a shoot with KC Concepcion for her morning show "Simply KC". The guest for the day was Vina Morales, and the topic was motherhood. So you ask me, what the hell does motherhood have to do with belly dancing?

Well, easy! Fitness is something moms forget because they get too caught up in daily errands. So a fun way to keep fit is by engaging in sports and other activities. In this case, belly dancing was the activity of choice. Yay!

Drama Queen, Veil Dance - Complete Choreography

We've finally completed the Drama Queen choreography! A big round of applause to my students, who executed the choreography well. Those eight sessions of sweat, body pain, and sore muscles were worth it after seeing this. Until the next choreography!

Drama Queen, Veil Dance Choreography

Here we are again with our dance class videos! My students are starting to hate me for posting videos publicly. But ladies, there is nothing to be ashamed of, I mean, look at your progress!

For this workshop, we're doing a veil choreography, by special request. The students wanted to use props, and I think the veil is perfect for their first exposure to belly dance props. This is us at the 5th lesson for this workshop, the choreography is about 2/3 done. Stay tuned for the complete dance, I should be posting that within 2 weeks.

Tabi Tabi Choreography - Complete choreography

Here it is finally! After one cycle of the workshop (8 sessions), we have finally completed the choreography. However, the minute the students found out that I was filming this, they conveniently moved away from the camera ;P. Doesn't matter if you're camera shy or not, but bravo to my students for having enough storage in their memory banks to execute a 5-minute dance. :)

By request, I will be teaching a veil dance for the next workshop. Till then!

Tabi Tabi Choreography - the first half

My New Year's resolution was to keep a video archive of my choreographies. It's such a shame not to record them, because I completely forget each choreography after a month or so. I wish I had done this sooner! It would've been great to see how sucky my previous choreographies were. :p

This is especially useful if I want to re-use or re-hash these for future use. It's also great for students, because they're able to see and monitor their progress (this works for my technique for the same reason too!).

So here's the first half of Tabi-Tabi. Watch out for the complete choreography in the coming weeks.

*Note: This class is a mixed level class. Some have been taking my class for years, and some have been taking my class for 4 sessions. So you might notice that some are more comfortable with the movements than others. But like I always say, we'll all get there!

Ringga Ringga Choreography

From the movie soundtrack of "Slum Dog Millionaire". The students loved the music!

Tamminy Aleek Choreography - Before and After

Hakim is always fun to dance to. Here is a Hakim hit - Tamminy Aleek - I choreographed for my belly dance class.


Before: This is me giving out instructions.



After: Finished product. My students are awesome.

Aaja Nachle Choreography

As a teacher, there is no greater joy than seeing your students do something they never thought they can do. This is a beginner's class, and these ladies have taken the belly dance class for about a month. Some started as awkward dancers, very unsure of how capable they are or insecure of how to move their bodies. The end result is something I, and most especially they, can be proud of.

The music is from the Bollywood hit, Aaja Nachle.



Here is another version I choreographed for the ADB Dance Guild:

Videos, finally!

So whenever we get inquiries about our performances, potential clients always ask us if we have any videos of our performances. In this day and age of the internet, it's not very difficult to Youtube our performances, right? Right?

Well, uh, sadly, for the past 4 years or so, I've always directed clients to this blog to check out the pictures, and to see where we've performed and who we've performed for. I shamefully admitted that we didn't have videos, and hoped that the pictures would suffice. I guess that kinda worked because we've gotten enough clients who see us "perform" through photos. Thank you for trusting us!

But now, voila! We have a total of 2 videos available for online viewing. It's a good start. And hopefully, people record more of our performances and post it online. Ch-ch-ch-check us out:

Baila Dance Studio Recital, June 2008 at the RCBC Theater in Makati
Aryn, Ros, Monica and me are joined by Tonette (another teacher at Baila) and Inka, a student at Baila



Ayala Land Premiere Sales Kick-Off Event, January 2009 at The Embassy in Taguig
A short clip of me, Ros, Aryn, Mons and Carmelle at a super energetic party. This performance was fun, because you can just feel the electricity in the air.

So that's that, we are now high-tech. Hooray for us.

Nike Women Bellydance Video