Getting Things Rolling
It’s been a long time since I put hand to keyboard on a dance topic. Most of the non-writing time was spent wondering if writing about bellydance was worth the the pain it causes me. The pain is on several levels. To begin, I confess to not being an easy writer. The Right Words set in complete and nicely varied sentences molded into well formed paragraphs don’t just flow fluidly from brain to screen. Writing takes beauçoup time and considerable mental energy: I literally sweat it out. And, if I’m going to put myself through the minor ordeal of dragging an essay out of my easily distracted, recalcitrant mind I want to know that it’s for a good reason, that there’s some chance that my efforts will have an effect out there in the world beyond the web. I write in hopes of making a difference, even if it’s just getting a couple of people to think a new thought or to take a second look at something they’ve accepted without reflection.
A second consideration about picking up discussing bellydance in a public forum is my state of withdrawal from the business of the dance. I no longer perform or teach; I do not vend (beyond selling a couple of cds on Amazon.com) or promote; I’ve gutted my website; my brief foray into publishing was one of the most dismaying periods of my adult life, simply one of the worst things to have happened to me that didn’t have to do with a failed romance. After twenty-five years of active engagement with the dance I looked around me, shed a few tears about what I saw, and backed away.
Lately, however, I’ve begun to look around again to see what people were getting themselves up to. My inbox has been filling with notices of unusual sounding events mostly offered by familiar names but some from new places. Consequently, it’s occurred to me I should venture out of my cave and take a look. To be honest, I didn’t and don’t expect enjoyment or delight or amazement–I am emphatically not an optimist–but I am curious and my divorce from the dance isn’t final.
What I’ve seen has been mostly appalling but there have been a few lovely performances around to temper my dismay. Let’s start with the good stuff: Leila Haddad’s one woman show under the aegis of World Music Institute was excellent. Ms. Haddad, working with an Egyptian band on a minimally set and wonderfully lighted stage demonstrated the range and adaptability of the folk forms and steps that provide the basis of raqs sharqi. Staying within the conventions of the dance while drawing on a variety of influences, Ms Haddad mixed and matched an array of mostly familiar steps and gestures to produce a program which contained unity of mood and concept while exploring a range of emotions. And she brought in an Egyptian band that was to die for; there’s nothing like great live music. I’m not going to give a play-by-play of the concert. For that go to Amy Bonham’s detailed review in Gilded Serpent at http://www.gildedserpent.com/art44/leilahphotos.htm.
For the purposes of this piece, what matters about Leila Haddad’s show is how in its excellence it demonstrated the limitations of the dance. While Haddad’s show was as good as it can get– the music stirring, the costuming beautiful and appropriate, the pacing exemplary, the artist a master of her form at the height of her powers–in the end, it still wasn’t quite enough. For those of us who have immersed ourselves in oriental dance Leila’s performance reminded us of how beautiful the dance should be, how expressive a vehicle it is for a sensitive dancer. But it also, in its near perfection, demonstrated how narrow the range of expression suitable to the material really is.
Everyone who talks about Haddad mentions that she makes a big deal about not doing cabaret shows. She tells us her mission is to elevate the dance from the disrepute in which it has been held. I, for one, question her premise. While it has been said that at one time and in certain quarters dancers were “for rent” at the end of the night to the highest bidders, at the point that Haddad began her career the cabaret had been long separated from the brothel. If prostitution was the source of disrepute that so concerns Haddad, she’s worried about a problem that no longer existed. At least not in the west. What people are doing and thinking around the dance in other parts of the world are neither hers nor our to reform.
Perhaps she is referencing the sideshow, the carny origins of the dance as a popular entertainment. This strain has existed since the dance was first presented in the West as a midway attraction and anthropological oddity during the days of the great 19th Century Expositions. Again, those days are long over.
Most probably, Haddad is referring to the average expectable nightclub or restaurant show in which the dancer has to compete with dinner and drinks and waiters for attention and is paid partly in tips. Sometimes even in body tips, perish the thought. Personally I’ve found that if the dancer is really entertaining and expert, she has no trouble keeping all eyes on her. And she can control the placement of tips. For an artist like Leila Haddad doing a cabaret show may feel like “casting pearls before swine” but for most of us it’s our bread and butter. And even more, the cabaret shows are a continual challenge in meeting changing conditions and new audiences In the end it whatever she’s attempting “elevate” it from doesn’t really matter. What does matter is whether such elevation is needed.
I contend that it is not. Many of the dance’s current woes grow out of misguided attempts to turn it into something bigger and grander than it is while discarding the very features the make the dance beautiful and unique. The oriental is a small thing, a bijou, a beautifully cut jewel in an exquisite setting. It is built out of small tender gestures and subtle, precise moves. The tilt of the head, the twist of a hip, the emotions that flicker across that dancer’s face: these are where the enchantment lives. And these are what are lost with distance or worse, distorted by the dancer in her attempts to be seen at the back of a theater.
The demands of the stage are contrary to the dynamics of the oriental. The stage dance is about movement in space. Designs are described in floor patterns; negative space matters. The traditional oriental, on the other hand, is contained. Spacial considerations are few and deal mainly with responding to the placement of the audience and the musicians
I believe that the dance is at its best when it is a spontaneous three way conversation that among the musicians, the dancer and audience. The dancer makes the music visible to the audience, the audience’s appreciation is heightened and feeds back to the musicians. (The most compelling moments of Leila Haddad’s concert took place when she worked directly with the band, when there was a direct exchange between dancer and musician.) The stage show is about the performer. The audience are merely witnesses, the musicians not necessarily present, and the moment reproducing an original that happened in rehearsal. This can be interesting, it can even be lovely, but it is not vital in any sense of the word.
Enough for now.