TribalDancer

Well, it so happens Rachel didn't start in ATS. She was a cabaret dancer for ages. She didn't really get into tribal until she was doing fusion with Ultra Gypsy (who at the time was still doing some ATS, but mostly fusion), and didn't take from Carolena until much much much more recently (in the grand scheme).

I love it when people assume that Rachel somehow sprung from ATS. She didn't. And today what she does is so far from those roots, I am not a fan of her style being called tribal anything (as much as I love to claim that gorgeous, talented creature for "the tribal side", it just isn't accurate! .

So if someone wants to learn what Rachel does without learnign ATS, so be it. It's not like that style came from ATS in the first place, or retains much of the tribal roots she later added.

This is why I hate the word tribal fusion being used as it is in the first place...The implication is, naturally, that it is fusing tribal. But a lot of what is out there under that name isn't fusing it in the least!

staranise

I'm confused, isn't tribal a fusion anyway? I thought that tribal wasn't explicitly ATS, that it all began with Jamila Salimpour and the original Bal Anat dressing in a more fokloric style to suit the ren faires, or is that different? how is what RB does any less tribal? I'm just curious as to what actually defines tribal now.

forgive my Naivete, I have only briefly read the Tribal Bible, and the tribal scene here in australia is relatively small, especially where I live.
I hope I'm not opening up a can of worms....

staranise

ahhh and I just noticed that huge other thread, it's answered a lot of my questions, thankyou!

Aziyade

The big debate -- at least in the US -- is whether or not Tribal was first and foremost a COSTUMING style or a DANCE style.

The original Bal Anat wasn't "tribal" in any way that we would think of today. They did the same movements at the Renn Faire in the day that they did at the clubs in the nights. The costuming was more "ethnic" in appearance for the Renn Faire, because that was a look that worked for them.

Eventually they created a SHOW based around what Jamila understood to be ethnic dances from North Africa (or inspired by them) and that became the more formal Bal Anat show. (We got to see ancient footage of the dancers when Suhaila brought the new Bal Anat to St. Louis. It was AWESOME!!)

You can see old photos of Masha Archer on line, and even then you can see her exploring her costuming ideas, but "Tribal" as a dance style hadn't been born yet.

Did Tribal as a DANCE begin with Jamila? Not really, even though Suhaila likes to say it does LOL. Carolena was Masha's student and never even took a class with Jamila, but Carolena created the group improv style of DANCE that would be called Tribal.

So if you think Tribal is COSTUMING, then yes it began with (or at least might have been popularized by) Bal Anat. But as far as a DANCE style it had nothing to do with Bal Anat, and came later.

lizaj

However different Rachel Brice's solo fusion was, you could always see the belly dance!
..and is it true that she is going back if not to cabaret but to ATS format dancing?

TribalDancer

No, she is not doing ATS format dancing, as far as I have ever heard. I would be curious to hear or see that!

And Aziyade is right. A lot of people want to lay claim to being the founders of "Tribal", but the fact is that Bal Anat may have had the first moniker which included the word tribal, but they didn't have a different style. They were cabaret and folkloric (fakeloric--Jamilla admits to making stuff up ), and used a chorus inasmuch as the rest of the dancers stayed onstage at the same time as featured acts were performing, and sometimes played zills or interacted. Hahbi Ru, too, is often called tribal, but they too are folkloric, and not tribal in that sense of the word.

For the first truly new style of movement and approach to the dance, that began with Carolena and ATS. Which is why I wish people would stop saying "But Bal Anat! But but but!" Because it really wasn't the beginning of the thread as we follow it as a dance STYLE.

Aziyade, I love you.

It's funny trying to pin labels on bellydance "back then". As Carolena has said, back then they didn't have the knowledge or the community drive to label things like we do today. Everything was just bellydance--good or bad, but bellydance. So trying to say it was this or that...it wasn't because anyone was necessarily *trying* to be this or that. They were just doing what they felt, or what the situation was calling for (like the Ren Faires, which demanded different costuming and staging than other situations).