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Arabian Nights, Northern
Lights When I went to Saba Middle Eastern Dance Ensemble’s Arabian Nights, Northern Lights show, I had no idea what to expect. I am a skinny middle aged non-dancing woman who has lived in the Yukon for 22 years and I always thought bellydancing was something the harem did to entertain their sultan. However, Nita Collins, the founder of Saba Dance Ensemble was a friend of mine, a fellow musician in our local big band, and I was curious to find out what it is she does when she’s not playing the Bari sax. She told me she had invited master dance instructor Jalilah Zamora to the Yukon for the occasion, so I knew that this evening would be something very special. That’s about all I knew, so bear with me while I describe what I experienced from a complete neophyte’s point of view. The lighting was low and the stage with its curtained backdrop and cushions on the floor did remind me of a sultan’s tent, so imagine my surprise when a local First Nations dance troupe came out and drew us all into the legend of how Raven stole the sun and moon and stars and gave them to the world for our light. This was beautifully danced to the narration with Andrameda Hunter very convincing as Raven. To my amazement this very Yukon sequence segued into a dramatic modern Turkish Oriental dance in which the whole Saba Dance Ensemble welcomed Raven into their land. It was all a Northerner needed to really settle in and savour the exotic sights and sounds to come. The audience had been told that it was not only okay, but expected for us to call out our appreciation, so “oh-pah”, “eye-wah” and “lah-lah-lah” we did. (All these terms are written phonetically, my apologies to those who can spell them correctly.) [Opa! Aiwa! And the zaghareet ~ Ed.] Jalilah Zamora surprised us by coming up through the audience to dance a traditional folkloric Ghawazee dance from Upper Egypt wearing an authentic Ghawazee dress. I have no idea how old Jalilah is, but on stage she appeared to be a supple young gypsy girl, delighted to be showing us what she could do and inviting our appreciation. There was something so sweetly vulnerable about the way she drew us in, she just won my heart. Middle Eastern dance, I thought watching her, is very sensual to watch, but not in the voyeuristic way Westerners might assume. It seemed very intimate and warm to me, connected to the viewer, a celebration of femininity. “Lah-lah-lah-lah!” “Oh-pah!” That feeling of connection continued into the next number when the Saba Dance Ensemble performed a style of traditional women’s social dance from the Arabian Gulf each wearing a different brightly coloured “thobe al nasha’al”, which appeared to be a baggy over-dress that could be drawn up over the head like a hood. Apparently this type of dance is seldom staged as it is traditionally performed in the home, and it seemed just like that to me. The dancers interacted like they were part of a family, and somehow managed to extend that feeling out to the audience. It made me feel my connection to women halfway across the world. And I thought of the times in my life when it would have felt exactly appropriate to celebrate a family event with everyone dancing. “Eye-wah!” The same dancers then performed to music written especially for the “Princess of Cairo”, Nagwa Fouad of Egypt. I couldn’t get over the beauty of their costumes, such vivid colours, their hair, and the incredible glow these women had while they danced! I’d seen a lot of them before, here and there working in town or shopping or whatever. This is a small place after all, but when they were dancing they became extraordinary, mesmerizing to watch. Then my very familiar friend, Nita Collins was introduced. She was going to do a dance especially for her husband adapted from choreography by Morocco of NYC. It was to a Lebanese love song called “The Moon and We are Neighbours”. The moment Nita came out on stage was breathtaking. This wasn’t the Nita I knew. She was wearing this incredible midnight blue, floor length, flowing gown studded all over with what appeared to be stars. She wore long, tight fitting wrist to shoulder covers to match, kind of like long evening gloves without the gloves. She started almost mischievously, standing still as I recall, facing the audience doing little ripples of movement that somehow magically isolated parts of her anatomy I didn’t know had muscular control. Then she started to really use the stage, red hair streaming behind her like a comet. As I watched her flash and swirl, I had a kind of dejà vû: I felt myself to be a young child again, on the farm, on a summer night, my first time looking up at the stars, and the awe of seeing them hanging above me, infinitely deep and beyond counting. There was a sense of mystery so bottomless you could fall into it and swim forever. This is a very poor dance review. I realize I have said nothing about the techniques I saw and all the different traditions represented. Jalilah came out and danced two more stunning numbers. Nita danced to a drum solo. Saba Dance Ensemble performed to a traditional Turkish folk song, as well as did North American bellydance and a Pharonic style piece. In fact, I’ve stopped describing the show well before the intermission. But something really unusual happened during “The Moon and We are Neighbours”. I guess you could say I was “transported”. If this is the magic of Middle Eastern Dance, then I got it. They ended the show with the First Nations group, returning Raven from the Land of the Arabian Nights to the land of the Midnight Sun, and I was glad they did that. I left afterwards with all the sky pulled together for me. Marie Carr
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