janaki

I put the clips of Alf leila we leila perfromed by Lucy from Egypt, Didem from Turkey and Jillina from US. What are your comments???

Lucy


Didem


Jillina


My comments:
Lucy is being typical egyptian.Very controlled moves and lot of repetitions. Gorgeous!!! ( Sorry, I am biased towards egyptian style)

Didem style is kinda fusion between am cab and turkish ( vibrant moves). Music has turkish flavour to it. There is something about this lady and me,won't go together well. Love her dynamic techinique.

Jillina: Her moves look the biggest of the three. Love the simplicity in the choreogrphy but still.......

Suheir

Less is more!

gisela

sometimes less is a bore
not saying it is here though.

I can't make up my mind about Didem. I mean, she's a great dancer, there's just something about her arms that's a bit robotic. Maybe I find her too polished- perfect body, completely choreographed, no smiles to let the audience in...
I kinda like her though.

Kiraze

I really did not like any of these

I love Lucy´s joyful expression but she was stiff and dancing looked somehow forced - maybe her back pains are reason for that... too bad as she has been fantastic fluent dancer.

I did not notice Turkish flavour in Didem´s music - sounded like from some basic not-so-high-quality dance recording and she had far too much speed in her dance (fast pace suits Turkish music but not Egyptian) and I HATE her slashing arms... she looks like tryng to kill flies

Jillina´s movement were huge - what I have seen of her is not this big but maybe this was because this performance is from her beginners teaching DVD and she wanted to demonstrate movements so big that everyone can really see and copy them better

My favourite American version (this far) is by Aziza - her movements are also big but I love her fluidity:

slinks

Well, I guess I'm just way too Americanised I love Jillina and Aziza !!

maariku

Lucy, yes, even I can figure out she is very Egyptian But I am very much distracted by her arms, somehow her arms just don't look good to me

Didem - I think it is the best clip of her I've seen so far. Except for the beginning bit, which looked very nervous somehow, I really enjoyed it. Only, her shoulder rolls always look oddly exactly the same. I loved the little butt-bump-led-wave she used near the end

I did like Aziza and Jillina, so I guess i am just as Americanized The only thing was, that at some point Jillina's moves were really big... But it sort of made me realise that I probably too make some overtly big gestures with my arms and upper body.

Gosh, I seem to be all about arms today :P

__________________
"[A good bellydancer] must express life, death, happiness, sorrow, love and anger, but above all she must have dignity." -Tahia Carioca,

taheya

I love lucy's dancing here!! She is definately the best for me, wonderful small intricate moves. I think she is great! I dislike didem's style, she is not dancing in my opinion more like a contortionist robot with no emotion or connection, i have said this before about her dancing. Jillina is very predictable in a BDSS way never see anything new from her and there are so many jillina clones out there now, where is the excitement in that? I am not keen on azizza's interpretation either, though i appreciate she and jillina are great dancers but just not my type of dancing, I am an egyptian style fan!

TiaSerena

I liked Lucy with her concentrated movements but I did get a little tired of watching after a while.

As for Didem, my first thing is how does she dance in those heels?!?! I could only picture me concentrating on not falling on my bum instead of my movement. But anyhow, I couldn't stand her arms as they were very robotic to me. The end of the the performance was the most exciting for me. She does have wonderful turns and I like that butt lead into the wave thing too Maariku.

I am Americanized as well I guess because I like Jillina. I agree with Kiraze about this being a performance for the Instructional DVD. I think that's why it was very big and simple. I think there are dancers that drastically exceed her, but I like her.

This is the first time I saw this clip of Aziza... and I really liked it. I love her traveling movements... she makes it look like nothing!

If I pick a fave out of the four clips (basing only on these clips) I would pick Aziza.

Eshta

I am still waiting to see the 'perfect' interpretation of this song in my eyes! It's such a familiar song I think it would be very difficult to lend it the fresh air it deserves - it's truly a fantastic piece of music, there really is a reason it's so well known! I've never even attempted to dance to it although it really captured my heart when I first heard it. Just so hard to do it justice!

So, my vote goes to.... Aziza! At least so far. She had some degree of 'soul' in her performance, it felt more than just a series of movements lined up in a choreography. Jillina's was nice too, but I think that it felt too rehearsed. Lucy... well, I am a big fan of the Egyptian style, it's my favourite but i think more could be done with such a dramatic piece. And I hated Didem's 'interpretation'. I'm really happy that you can layer a shimmy and a flutter, but the song demands more than cheap tricks and gadgetry. And the flailing arms missed the mark.

Sure they all speak highly of me too!

But I'm still waiting for the interpretation that melts my heart, I know it's possible, just not seen it yet!

janaki

Lucy looked like she is dancing with soul but not enough for. Didem and Jillina looks cold with no soul in the dance. Didem is like a show girl.....look at me, what I can do....look at me...look at me......

I am with you on this Eshta, I am waiting for a piece that melts my heart!!!!