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Judy |
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About Judy |
| Middle Eastern Dance connects the dots between
spirituality and deep sensuality for me. It supports my feminine
sensibility. It is this complexity and paradoxical quality that engages
and enriches my soul. Middle Eastern Dance on the west coast is an
amalgam. It embraces the dance heritage of many middle eastern countries
and marks an American evolution of feminine strength and spirituality
through dance. I have studied, danced and taught middle eastern dance
beginning in the late 1960ıs, through the early 1980ıs. After a hiatus, I
resumed dancing in 1999. My dance education began with Hillary Ewing at an Oakland Park and Recreation center. Middle Eastern dance was fad level in the late 1960ıs, and everyone went. After a year, Hillary sent me to study with her teacher, Jamila Salimpour, a dancer with thirty years experience and the matriarch of middle eastern dance in the Bay Area. I trained with Jamila for five years. Her studio was above the middle eastern nightclubs on San Franciscoıs Broadway. She often asked her young daughter, Suhaila, to demonstrate more vigorous step, like Turkish drops. I not only learned to dance but to parallel park on the steep streets of The City. Jamila required all of her students to become professional dancers . Fortunately, Jamila and Fadil hosted ³ energy celebrations² at Fadilıs middle eastern nightclub, the Casbah , which counted towards being a professional. Any student from a Bay Area teacher was welcome to participate or observe. In order to meet Jamilaıs requirement, and still retain my day membership in the Joaquin Miller Elementary School PTA, I ³ semi-secretly² danced monthly at the Casbah nightclub for two and one half years. The music was wonderful, the stage was small and the dressing room impossibly crowded. The experience was simultaneously scary and joyful. The nightclub was packed with dancers and teachers, watching every move. I never failed to marvel at how dancers came alive when they danced and appeared more beautiful. During this time, I also studied with some of Jamilaıs best dancers: four years of weekly classes with Aida and three years of private lessons with Katrina Burda. Aida has a wonderful sense of the music; Katrina is highly gifted with stomach isolations. She hosted full moon dance parties in her Berkeley home that included live middle eastern music. Plus, I took master dance classes with Ibrahim Farrah,and Bora Ozkok in 1975, Dahlena, and Morocco in 1976, and later classes from Serena, Ahmad Jarjour, Najia Marlyz, Hassan Oukrin and Feiruz Aram. In the mid 1970ıs I spent one week in New York City, studying with Morrocco and Ibrahim Farrah. In 1975, I traveled to Greece and Turkey where I observed and participated in middle eastern dance. In 1999 I began studying with Cory Zamora. Cory is highly gifted with fine tuning movements with the melody and the rhythm. She hosts special events where live music and dance thrive. To complement my dancing, I took middle eastern cooking lessons from Joyce Goldstein in her California Cooking School in San Francisco and Arabic language lessons from Jim Waldron in the San Fernando Valley. I cook far better than I speak Arabic, having, unfortunately, retained very little of the language. Both were great teachers, however. I taught middle eastern dance classes and private lessons in a variety of settings. These include the substituting for San Francisco Bay Area teachers and teaching at the Adult Education Program for Montclair Presbyterian Church, the San Pedro YWCA , Redondo Beach Dance Center, in rented dance studios in Torrance and Palos Verdes Peninsula , CA and in my home. My professional life has included dancing in nightclubs, restaurants and private parties. Besides the Casbah in San Francisco, I danced at the Casbah International Restaurant and Casablanca Restaurants in the Bay Area. In Southern California, I danced for three years at Baboosh Moroccan Restaurant, and for many private parties. Plus, I have danced at professional gatherings in the Los Angeles area, and more recently, with Coryıs dancers at Fairs and special events in the San Joaquin Valley. I am very grateful to have the opportunity to study and dance with so many great dancers, and listen to wonderful live music. It is soul enlivening |
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