4th June 2011 at the Rialto Dance Academy, Acocks Green, Birmingham: level 1 ATS, with Ashima Tribal, taught by Claire Challand.
This was by far, an excellent, well-paced and thought out ATS intensive. At level 1, it was an introduction to/drilling of the basic family moves(fast and slow) zilling patterns, Tribal posture, stage presentation and formations. It also served as sound revision for those with experience of ATS.
Claire has a welcoming, professional , reassuring teaching methodology and presence and could break everything down, very clearly and well, checking moves and postures, putting people into groups for their practice drills and experimenting (!). She was extremely encouraging and positive, with a lot of enthusiasm. She checked our learning with questions and drilling, as well, as getting all of us to have a go on our own in groups. She demonstrated moves, or got some of us to demonstrate moves.
There were some moves/formations that were challenging or had not been practised before, by some of us. Some hadn’t done zilling before, for example, but everyone tried it, feeling they had learned something new and were now on a new dance journey.
The workshop was divided into manageable sections of slow moves (taxeem/hand floreos and arm undulations, body wave) followed by zill work (basic and most commonly used rhythms) then formations, fast moves( Egyptian basic with turns, pivot bumps and choos), torso work and shimmy drills, finally the Arabic step with a carefully chosen overview drill of everything we had done, with Claire at the front, then in our groups, one by one, accompanied by a zilling circular chorus (Claire called out our groups one by one to go into the centre and dance in our formations, remembering what we had learned).
Breaks were not forgotten, and these were well timed, and helped students re-charge and get on with the next parts of the class.
There was a lot of fun, laughter, with questions and answers thrown in , to faciliate better learning. We all loved the pirate song, she threw in to break down the 3/4 shimmy, a very interesting skipping technique………..
A lot of us, came feeling much more confident, encouraged and knowledgeable: and knowing we would have to practice more outside the workshop!
The atmosphere in the class was lively and very friendly, and conducive for learning.
Ashima Tribal is arranging another intensive at Level 2, for 9/10 July 2011- an intensive weekend. So hopefully, there will be many of the same crowd coming back for more…. (Contact Claire Challand on Facebook for more details on this) also visit http://www.bamba.org.uk/classes_events.htm to find over 50 belly dance classes in the Birmingham area including Claire
Thanks Claire and Anita (Hughes) !
