Rina Belly Dancer

Hey Dance Enthusiasts!

I haven’t published an article in a while (sorry) because I am back in school now and quite swamped! I just wanted to post up a couple clips from YouTube of two of my favorite belly dancers. The first clip is of American belly dancer Dahlena whom I have had the greatest privilege of taking learning from in her fabulous workshops. The second two clips are of Fifi Abdou, a legendary Egyptian belly dancer of the golden era. I love the style of both of these dancers and hope you enjoy watching them and learning more about them! (more…)

You may have seen belly dancers before at a Middle Eastern restaurant or night club, or perhaps at a birthday party or wedding. Want to know more about having a belly dancer as entertainment at your next event? (more…)

Oh man, I’m a little exhausted after this intense week of dance. My birthday party was so much fun, I was really excited about getting to share my passion for belly dance with all of my friends and family, many of whom had rarely is ever witnessed it before. It was a fun way to show them this huge part of my life in a way that was fun for everyone.

Next thing to look forward to is my class starting on Saturday. I am really excited and have been getting all my music and curriculum ready.

Beginner belly dance class is an hour long and will meet for the first time meet on Saturday, August 15th at 2pm. The class will take place at Galleria Unico located at 44 E Superior. I highly recommend taking public transportation, parking is street and very hard to come by.

There is no registration required and the class will be ongoing. You can take the first class for $8. The rates beyond that are $15 for one class, $12 per class for a 10 class card and $10 per class for a 20 class card. You do not need to take your classes consecutively but after a year class cards will expire.

As far as clothing goes, you want to wear something comfortable that you can move freely in. Many girls like to tie a scarf or coined belt around their hips to clearly see their positioning and hear the rhythm of their movements, this is by no means a requirement. You can dance barefoot or in socks. Sometime girls like to buy dance shoes, but when your starting off I would recommend you stay away from anything with a heal.

If you need any more information, send me an email at class@princessrina.com. Don’t forget to sign up for the student mailing list on the Classes page.

Super great week for belly dancing comming up!!!

First of all, I will be performing with Angelina’s dance group this Friday, 7:30pm at Julianna’s Restaurant located at 3001 W. Peterson Ave in Chicago. The event is a showcase for Chicago dancers hosted by master belly dance instructor Dahlena.

Dahlena’s Chicago Workshop kicks off on Saturday. Dahlena is an EXCELENT instructor, her workshops are fabulous and I highly recommend them. Great technique, beautiful choreographies and tons of fun! See her website for more information. Unfortunately, I will be missing the first day of the workshop because I have an event, but you can expect to see me there the other 4 days!

We will simultaneously preparing to do a show for my birthday celebration which is next Thursday, August 6th! I am so excited, the party is at a beautiful Chicago night club and I be again performing with Angelina’s group. I can’t wait!!!

In other news, I just had a great photoshoot with a wonderful photographer named Hadassah yesterday. I should have the pictures ready and online in the gallery in the next couple days!

Please check out Dahlena’s workshop and if you ever need pictures, you should definitely contact Hadassah, shes very talented.

I am going to start teaching Basic/Beginner Belly dance classes on Saturdays at 2pm. Classes will most likely be starting August 8th or August 15th. They will be held at Galleria Unico which is located at 44 E. Superior St. I will be running a first class special at only $8. More information and details coming soon! Check the Classes section to add yourself to my student email list.

Hey everyone, I know alot of these might seem like “DUH” rules for performing, but you’d be suprised how many people get some of this stuff wrong.

•    Always be on time
•    If you are working a special event, dress like you are attending a special event. Do not show up to someone’s wedding in jeans and a T-Shirt.
•    Make a performance day check list. Start writing your list a day or two in advance of your performance.
•    Bring business cards and carry them with you as much as you can.
•    Bring an extra costume.
•    Pack your skirts inside out, and anything with beading on it should be in separate plastic bags inside your bag.
•    Bring back up CDs with a variety of music so you can pick based on the tone of the event..
•    Make an emergency kit, you never know what might come in handy. My emergency kit includes: scissors, hot glue gun, lots of safety pins.
•    Bring a book, a snack and a bottle of water.
•    Make sure you have some cash and your ID.
•    Darken your eye-brows. All of you!
•    Usually not a good idea to drink, even if someone offers it to you.
•    Be yourself and have fun!

Hey everyone!

In case anyone didn’t notice, my website is finally up and mostly operational. I still don’t really have a working gallery, and there are a million other things I want to add, but at least it’s there! Anyway, I hope my post about shimmys was helpful, I had lots of fun creating it!

I just wanted to drop in and tell you about an event happening this weekend. Click Here to view the official site for Family Reunion 11. Its a three day camping party near Antioch Ill that supports a drug/alcohol free environment and natural spiritual enlightenment. I have never gone before but I am really excited to check it out, the host Dave Zim does very interesting events in Chicago and I love performing for his audiences.

I will be performing sometime on Saturday evening, and I’ll be doing something a little different then the traditional Oriental performance. I will be working with Dj/Music Producer Danny Livewire to create an original performance set to Arabic/Electro fusion. We will be using many synthesized remixes of traditional songs as well as some of Danny’s original compositions. So come check us out if you can, it should be an amazing enjoyable weekend.

Hi Everyone,

I just wanted to drop by and give you a quick tipping tutorial for belly dance audiences.

It is a welcome and customary practice for an entertained audience to tip their dancers. While it typically comes in single dollar bill increments, larger bills are of course, welcome.

There are basically 2 ways to tip an dancer, one is to throw the money on top of her while she dances, usually making a nice pretty flutter of bills that snow to ground, and the other is to tuck them in to her costume. While tucking money into a dancers costume may make some people uncomfortable, its the best way to ensure the dancer actually receives her tips since it is unfortunately a pretty standard practice that money on the floor belongs to the night club.

When tucking money into a dancers costume, you want to put it only in her belt or arm bands. Tucking money into shoulder straps is acceptable, but risky and tucking money into her bra is always a no-no.  If the “tucking” is not your cup of tea, the dancer will most graciously accept tips in her hands as well.

Dancers always want to feel that their performance is appreciated and tipping is a great way to let her know! And while you up, how about a few shoulder shimmies with her!

How do you shimmy? While the older more traditional shimmy involves a teeter-tatter motion in the hips caused by engaging the glutes in an alternating pattern, the newer and by far more popular version is done through the legs, by fluttering the knees back and forth. While some people prefer one way and other people prefer another way, I believe both are essential skills for all belly dancers.

The Neutral Position In belly dance, unless you are doing a pose, there is no such thing as a strait leg, you should always always ALWAYS be in a slight plie (bent knees). So the basic “neutral” position of belly dance, is a demi plie with a flat back, weight just over the hips, tummy engaged head and rib cage pulled to the ceiling with the shoulders down, creating space around the neck. Whatever position you chose to hold you arms in, make sure they are rounded and frame your body keeping the arm pits open.

The Leg Shimmy As I said earlier, the leg shimmy is done by fluttering the knees back and forth, you want to keep your upper body tight and engaged so it stays isolated from the lower body movements. Then bend one knee a little past neutral. As you return the knee to neutral, bend the opposite knee. Repeat at a slow speed until you understand the movement, remembering to never allow your knees to fully straighten. You can speed it up or slow it down and make the movement bigger or smaller depending on the character of the music and they energy you want in the shimmy. This is the technique dancers use to do “freeze shimmys” which creates a sort of vibration look. You need to tighten you muscles all through the legs in order to do a freeze shimmy.

So literally, all I am doing in this shimmy is slightly bending one knee more then the other and switching. This is a nice, easy shimmy, but it has one big weakness, it’s completely immobile. If you lift up a foot to walk, you will lose your shimmy since it requires both feet to be planted on the floor to flutter the knees. This is why its important to learn both techniques.

The Glute Shimmy The easiest way to feel the difference between the glute shimmy and the leg shimmy is to modify the neutral position to a lunge. You want to keep all of the characteristics of the neutral position, flat back, weight over hips, etc. but this time put one foot a few feet in front of the other, with your weight evenly distributed over both legs, and keeping you hips square facing forward.

From this position, fluttering your knees has become quite impossible. Instead, you want to isolate the hips to allow movement by staying long and lifted through the torso, keeping your stomach engaged and alternating flexing the glute muscles.

Keep your hips as square to the front as you possibly can. Do the movement slowly at first, keeping the lunge stance. As you become more comfortable, try it faster with your feet closer together. Next try it on one foot. This should become quite easy for you if you really practice controlling the movement through flexing you glute muscles. You will notice that when your feet are together and parallel, your knees will flutter back in forth during a glute shimmy in a similar way as th leg shimmy, however, this is mearly a side effect of the glutes flexing, as the legs are no longer in cntrol of the movement.

Shimmerific To the untrained eye, the visual difference between the glute shimmy with your feet together and parallel, and the difference from the leg shimmy is very subtle. However, the differences in the technique create a completely different set of advantages and disadvantages to each shimmy. The leg shimmy, as I said earlier, is much easier to makes small, quick, vibration like shimmys, while the glute shimmy allows mobility and versatility in your body position. Try a combination of both shimmys for something different!

The shimmy is a fundemental step in belly dancer, I hope this tutorial helps you understand the movement and the different techniques. If you have any questions, or there is a different technique you would like broken down, feel free to comment!

So my website isn’t working yet, which makes me a bit sad. My “web guy” is soaking up some sun in Florida, so I’m stuck site-less until he returns.  At least I have a blog to share these great links with you!

Dahlal International is a great resource, they’re website is beautiful, its very easy to use and they have a HUGE stock. They can be a bit on the pricey side, but check the sales rack often because some beautiful deals may show up. There warehouse is in St. Louis, I have desperately been meaning to go down there and check it out one of these days, I recommend you do the same!

Belly Dance With K Boutique is a good place for belly dancers on a budget. She seems to get her stock sporadically and sell out quickly so check the site often to catch her at the right time. Really good prices and fairly decent quality products.

Dancing Rahana is a great website to custom order items. It can take along time to receive, but the prices are good, the product is quality, and every dancer should have at least one custome sized bra and belt. She also has plenty of items in stock, and is easy to communicate with if you want to check the status of your custom order. I love the V shape belts on the Turkish costumes, its an extremely flattering look.

Happy shopping Belly Dancers, more links and ideas comming soon!