Come study alongside me!

July 8, 2015Sophia Ravenna

One of the online courses I'm taking! — One of the online courses I’m taking!

As I mentioned before, I’m considering 2015 to be my year of growth, but I could just as easily call it the “Year of Learn All the Things!” I’ve become hooked on on-line challenges and courses, in fact, I just signed up for two more. And while in the past I’ve waited and reviewed these things after the fact and said “Hey guys, you should totally do this if it becomes available again”, this time I’m inviting you to join me now. Both of these teachers are people who I’ve worked with in the past so I feel pretty comfortable recommending them to you.

First, I am starting Nadira Jamal’s Rock the Routine 7-week class on July 13th. I really enjoyed and learned a lot from her How to Build a Sustainable Practice Habit course, so I am happy to be studying with her again! This particular program explores the 6-part routine common to American Cabaret and Turkish Oryantal style dancing. While I don’t often have the chance to perform a full-length routine, and I don’t currently dance either of those styles, I’m still looking forward to rounding out my dance knowledge. Plus I feel like a better understanding of the structure of this traditional routine will help me better organize long set lists for my troupe, and someday my own full-length routines even if they’re more of a fusion style.

Then starting on August 3rd, as shown in the photo, I will be taking Amanda Rose’s 8-week Musicality Intensive through her new Amanda Rose Online program. I’ve studied musicality with Amanda Rose in the past, in classes and workshops, and I learned a lot, so I am really excited to see what I can pick up in 8 weeks. Plus this also covers more on how to choreograph, which is something I’ve been working to learn this year. I really feel like even as a fusion dancer, it’s good to have an understanding of Egyptian-style musicality, so you have the option of making use of it if you want to, when performing to Egyptian music.

One thing I like about both of these intensives is that they don’t require a daily commitment. Although I am proud of my accomplishments over the course of How to Build a Sustainable Practice Habit and the 100Days(tm) Improv Challenge, I’m also ready to pull back to just practicing 5 days a week and leaving weekends as an option. Especially during our hot Tucson summers, it’s nice to have one or two days a week where I don’t build up a sweat! Additionally, these programs have some flexibility, which accommodates travel plans or other busy weeks.

I hope that some of my dance friends will join me in my continued pursuit of knowledge and skills! If you’re going to take either of these courses, let me know in the comments!

Ballet Class

January 14, 2014March 25, 2014Sophia Ravenna

Ballet group at West School, courtesy of Flickr Commons

I just got back from ballet class a little bit ago. This year I hope to go 2x a week, and I think I’ll see a lot of improvement, especially once I feel like I know things well enough to practice them at home. Right now I still feel pretty awkward in class, but some things are starting to come more easily. Having a nice teacher and friendly classmates definitely helps, and these past several years of bellydance classes have taught me how to be good at accepting corrections.

Now it’s time to get back to getting the guest room ready. I’d rather be dancing!

More Ballet!

August 20, 2013March 25, 2014Sophia Ravenna

Alison Lee, [stage name Helene Lineva and star of the Original Ballet Russe, 1939-1940, posing in the studio and dancing on the roof of Dupain studio] photographed by Max Dupain.

It’s hard to believe, but I’ve actually been taking ballet classes for 4 weeks now. I go once or twice a week depending on how brave and motivated I’m feeling. And sometimes… I actually have fun! I’m still struggling with a lot of the material and I’m sure I will for a long time, but slowly I’m becoming more comfortable. It helps that the teachers at BreakOut are really nice and encouraging.

One reason why I’m taking ballet, even though I’m currently bad at it, is that when I get things right, I feel beautiful. I have long legs and arms, which sometimes makes me feel awkward in bellydance class (I always pull my arms in when I turn, for fear of hitting somebody), like I’m taking up too much space. But when I relax and allow myself to take all the room I need, and when I can do a full extension and just reach with my arms and legs, I feel lean and elegant. Ballet class is helping me develop proper form, strength, and flexibility to add those moments to my belly dance.

Cross-training: Ballet

July 30, 2013March 25, 2014Sophia Ravenna

I needed a ballet picture for this post so I went to The Commons on Flickr and found this. Wow!

Valentina Blinova in L’Oiseau de feu [The Firebird], Ballets Russes, Sydney, 1936-1937 / Max Dupain

I went to my first ever ballet class yesterday. I’ve been meaning to go for months and months. It’s something that my teacher Jolie has been encouraging me to do to improve my belly dance. But as I’ve confessed before on this blog, I am very nervous about doing new things. So every week I’d say “I should go to Beginner Adult Ballet on Thursday” and when Thursday rolled around, I’d make an excuse not to… too tired, not feeling well, want to laze around the house with my husband because he’s had a stressful week at work. Well, now there’s Beginner/Intermediate Ballet on Mondays, so I made myself go. I found out about it yesterday, so I had no time to make excuses.

Being in ballet class was totally different from being in bellydance class. Most of the class was spent doing exercises at the barre. The teacher Christy would explain what we were going to do and then watch us do it, rather than leading, which meant I spent a lot of time putting my ITS peripheral vision to use to “follow” the students who seemed to know what the heck they were doing. On the other hand, since Christy wasn’t leading, she was walking around the room giving corrections, and she was very nice and encouraging about it.

I probably should have gone to a straight-up beginner class rather than a beg/int one, because there seemed to be a definite expectation that the students already knew basic ballet terms and had some familiarity with what they were supposed to be doing. This meant that some things that we already do in bellydance class made sense to me, and others I just kind of stumbled along and hoped no one was looking at me. There was also a bit of material that is pretty difficult for a newbie, such as pirouettes (which we do sometimes in bellydance but I still suck at) and some fast jumping.

That said, since Monday at 4:30 is a pretty convenient time for me to go to class, and since I like a challenge, I think I might keep throwing myself into the deep end. Besides, we did exercises to Star Wars music, so my inner nerd was pleased even while my inner dance critic was crying “we’re so BAD AT THIS!!!”

By the way, speaking of my inner dance critic, I have a message for it: Of course we’re bad at ballet. We’re new to it. We were bad at ITS when we started, and we were bad at Tribal Fusion when we started. Everything has a learning curve, so just shut up and be patient.

EDIT: I have no idea what Blogger has done to this post. What a mess.

Dance Hard!

March 20, 2013March 25, 2014Sophia Ravenna

Whew. What a night. We did leaps and turns and extensions. Since we were doing leaps we had to do a major warm-up, which included stretching and splits. I have the worse splits of anyone in class. When I have to do splits, I just hate my body. But then Jolie said “Ok, run 5 times around the room as fast as you can” and you know what? I owned that. I outran everyone and I was ready to keep going. I guess I could have ran faster than I did.

My turns are also getting a lot better, which is a nice feeling. It’s really good to feel like I am making progress on things that have been difficult for me for a long time.

Good Bye, Studio A

December 19, 2012March 25, 2014Sophia Ravenna

Well, tonight was our last night of class in Studio A at the 4th Avenue location of BreakOut Studios. When classes return for the new year we will be in the new studio. It’s bigger. It’s warmer. It has better speakers. It doesn’t have that really weird mirror where there’s a strange raised part off the wall.

There are a couple of things I will miss about the current studio. I will miss having a convenient place to park on 4th Ave. I will miss being able to walk to all the great restaurants, cafes, bars and shops after class. I will miss the “Secret Dance Garden” behind Studio A, and showing up 20 minutes early for class to hang out with my troupemates on a nice Summer night.

But in general I am REALLY excited about the move!

A lot of people showed up tonight, maybe because it wasn’t as painfully cold as it was last night. It was good to see some familiar faces who hadn’t been around in a while, and to have a big group. It was a nice send-off for the room that has been our (sometimes awesome, sometimes awful) home for over a year.

The weekend is too short

December 17, 2012March 25, 2014Sophia Ravenna

How is it already 11:30 on Sunday night? This weekend flew by.

I didn’t end up performing at the Circus Farm fundraiser after all. The weather was far too icky to drive all the way up to Mesa and dance outdoors at night. Instead I ended up going to a holiday party, which was nice. Sometimes I get so wrapped up in dance (and this time of year, my jewelry business) and I just don’t make enough time to socialize with my friends.

Today I went to dance class in the too-cold studio. Two more nights of cold classes and then I am FREE! The studio is closing for 2 weeks starting on the 21st and moving to an exciting new venue with more room and best of all, HEAT! Oh, I can’t wait to no longer shiver my way through dance classes. I hope that the nicer, bigger studio also results in more new faces in class, and maybe in the troupe, too.

Then I went jogging, and it was also too cold, but you do what you gotta do. I did pretty well, until we stopped jogging and suddenly my calves decided to entirely cramp up. But that’s sadly pretty normal. Maybe if I didn’t subsist off of tea all winter long I would be less prone to calf cramps, but water is cold and tea is not. I guess I could drink plain hot water but that would be awful.

What a weekend!

December 3, 2012March 25, 2014Sophia Ravenna

I’ve had quite the busy weekend. On Saturday I went to the Tucson Belly Dance/Tucson Tribal Collective student recital to see my friends from those two groups dance, and my friend Martha from Phoenix met me there. The recital was held at the Cushing Street Bar and Restaurant which was a GREAT choice! The food was really good, and the outdoor courtyard was beautiful (and it was sunny and 80 degrees, so a perfect day to be outside). It was great to see what all of the students was working on, and there was a nice variety of performances. The show was just the right length, and I really appreciate that it was held at lunch time, so that Martha and I could hit 4th Ave to kill the rest of the afternoon, and then I could attend the art show that my troupemate Liora was in that evening!

Today I got back into the swing of things by attending drills and ITS and going for a jog this evening with some friends and my corgis. I felt good in class, happy with my current progress. I was worried that with how little I’ve been practicing lately, I would have lost a lot, but really, it’s only been a few weeks. Jogging went pretty well, too, and now my dogs are nicely tired out and lazing around the house instead of chasing the cats.

And on top of all of that, I have TWO more gigs coming up! I’ll be part of a group piece at BreakOut Studios as part of their Street Fair show on Saturday, and on Thursday I will be dancing at the VERY FIRST SKY BAR OPEN STAGE!!!! Woohoo! I am super excited because not only have I really been missing open stages, but Sky Bar is the perfect venue! I think people will be a lot more enthusiastic about coming out to see the dancers if they don’t have to plan their dinner around it. Besides, it’s such a pain to eat dinner while watching a show! Much better to kick back with a drink, and more affordable, too.

So far it’s looking like December is going to be pretty awesome!

A good time

September 26, 2012March 25, 2014Sophia Ravenna

I’ve really been enjoying classes again lately. There was a while, when I was frustrated by a lack of progress, where it felt like every class threw some stumbling block in my path and had me doubting myself. But now that I’ve managed to make some headway with things like chaine turns and some of our more difficult troupe choreographies, I’m feeling a lot more relaxed in class. I still struggle with things, but I don’t let it get me down. After all, this isn’t like a college class where I’m being graded and I have to worry about passing or failing. What is important is that I am there, I try my best, and I work on keeping a positive attitude.

Home practice, however, is a bit more of a struggle. Drilling things at home alone is boring! I mean, drilling in class is often boring, too, but at least I get corrections when I’m doing something wrong, and I get to see my friends before and after class. At home it’s just me and Daisy, who just sits on the couch and looks sad that I am dancing instead of rubbing her belly. She’s not a very good coach. I am having fun working on some new solos, and I am practicing troupe choreos because we’re coming into the busy performance season, but drilling basic skills is such a slog!

Uhm, ow

September 12, 2012March 25, 2014Sophia Ravenna

So today I ran into the first obstacle to my daily hour of practice. I had to take my car in for service and it was expected to be done between 3 and 4! Shoot! That’s my dance time! Not to be daunted, I moved my dance time from 1-2 and rushed through my housework before hand. I had a good hour of practice including nearly 10 minutes of chaine turns, and a few minutes of shimmies while petting Daisy the corgi, because she was scared of the thunderstorm.

Then I went to class and had the most physically difficult class ever — nearly an hour of levels. Oh, my poor quads. By the end, my legs were shaking uncontrollably. And I still had another hour-long class to get through! I’m afraid of the pain tomorrow will bring. But I also feel good, because I love being able to rise to a physical challenge like that, and I did some things that I thought I wouldn’t be able to.