A Musical Revolution

There was a time when Belly Dancing was just entertainment. It was just a man or a woman using their skill to move and even connect to music on a deep emotional level. But at the end of the day it was Orientale dance, it was performance dance. Beautiful, powerful, meaningful, skillful, but still performance dance.

Dance follows the traditions of music and so when we want to understand the direction that Belly Dancing is taking in the world today all we need to do is look to the music as it has grown and matured. Is it the same music of 50 years ago? Is it the same music of 20 years ago? Is it the same music of even 10 years ago? The music is growing, adapting and changing; new branches are forming. It would be egotistical to think that the only reason a new kind of sound emerges because of the dancers themselves. Trust me... if there were no dance there would still be music. But if there were no music would there be dance? How many dancers find themselves listening to a piece of music for the first time and thinking, "Wow, I really want to dance to this!" And how many dancers create a choreography or dance innovation and think, "Now if I only had some new type of music to put it to?"

I listen to music like that composed by Cheb I Sabbah and Azam Ali and I see an ancient future. I see the expression of things that we were not allowed to express as dancers 20 years ago. Give us the music and we will complete the revolution.

I was listening to a 13th Century Turkish piece last night, we're talking right after the first sacking of Constantinople in 1204, called Ey Derviccsler and I thought to myself... what a beautiful dervish piece. I would love to dance to this. I would love to share this. I've considered the same thing with Kyrie Eleison, adopting it as a Mithraic piece. I'm not ignorant of the sacred names called out during these songs or their histories. With my eyes open I want to dance to them. I want to dance to lyrical Rumi. I want to dance to those things that were denied to me as a "Belly Dancer" 15 years ago, 10 years ago. And so I wonder now, ...now that Belly Dance is not what it once was, now that the music is brought to the public through concerts and dance clubs, can I finally become the dancer that I want to be?

Its rather foolish to think that a puppet of the muses can do anything but follow what I am directed to do. As if I could suddenly will myself to stop dancing. Play the music and see what happens.