1] HOW DID YOU GET STARTED IN
DANCE & ATS?
I took my first dance class at
about 4 years old. I guess I'm what you'd call a "born
performer." I did every play and musical possible
throughout my school years and my focus was on acting. I
stumbled into Carolena's class by sheer good luck after
moving to San Francisco. I was on a mission to do all the
things I'd always wanted to but couldn't growing up and
bellydance was one of those things in the back of my mind.
After many, many referrals to FatChanceBellyDance I called
Carolena to ask if I could observe a class to see if it was
something I thought I could do and she said yes. I was
hooked from the first moment that I watched that class, and
her teaching it.
2] CAN YOU TELL US A LITTLE BIT
ABOUT YOURSELF?
I was born and raised in the
South-eastern US; most of my life in Birmingham, AL.
Strangely, I never felt like I was in the right place,
although I've returned to Birmingham after living in San
Francisco and then New Orleans for a number of years. I'm
married to a wonderful man and have an amazing little girl.
I live a vegan lifestyle (my entire family does) and home
school my daughter. What else can I say? I love teaching
and helping people do things that make them happy.
3] WHAT ABOUT DEVYANI DANCE
COMPANY?
Devyani was founded in New
Orleans, LA in 2000. (or maybe it was 2001?) It grew out of
my dance classes that I started after moving there. There
was no-one in the area doing ATS so I knew that if I wanted
to keep dancing I'd have to start teaching. I was offered
an opportunity to teach a class at a women's health club
shortly after moving to New Orleans and that's where it all
started. The original group was a very tight-knit one and
we grew by leaps and bounds. Before long we were performing
at all kinds of events all over New Orleans. That's the
group I was with when we brought in the 4 new moves that are
on Vol. 7. A few years later I moved back to Birmingham and
had to start the company all over again. I now have a
fantastic group of very talented and dedicated dancers here
that perform all over the place and teach at the studio.
It's always been about being the best we can be at ATS and
sharing it with others. The name Devyani means "gift from
the Goddess." We truly believe this dance is a gift.
4] CAN YOU TELL US ABOUT THE
PARTNERSHIP BETWEEN DEVYANI DANCE COMPANY & FAT CHANCE BELLY
DANCE?
The biggest thrill of my career
was when Carolena told me that she thought we should work
together in a partnership. The fact that I had moved all
the way across the country and managed to maintain the dance
in it's original form, staying in contact with her and
always seeking her guidance ended up being really
significant to both of us. We had grown to really like each
other and since we were doing the same thing it only made
sense to start doing projects together. I guess it really
took off when she invited me to teach with Karen Gehrman
(sp?) at the Majma Dance Festival in Glastonbury, England.
5] WHAT IS TRIBAL PURA & WHAT IS
ITS GOAL?
The more we figured out how we
were going to be working together the more we realized that
this new venture needed a name. Our original thought was to
call it "Pure Tribal", because that's what it is and that's
what we are sharing with people, but that name wasn't
available. We ended up choosing Tribal : Pura after
learning that Pura means whole or complete in hindi. The
purpose of the Tribal Pura workshops and shows is to bring
the knowledge of true American Tribal Style Belly Dance to
the world. Tribal style has split off into so many
variations, either by choice or from lack of access to the
original thing, that there wasn't really an understanding of
how to do ATS outside of FCBD. We're taking ATS to everyone
who wants to learn it or re-learn it in the correct way.
It's been such a great success. People are really starting
to understand what "tribal style" is all about and they are
falling in love with it all over again.
6] CAN YOU TELL US A LITTLE BIT
ABOUT THE GS CERTIFICATE & THE TEACHER TRAINING
CERTIFICATE?
GS and Teacher Training
Certifications are really Carolen's baby. She kept getting
asked about doing a certification program so she finally put
one together to certify people who wanted to teach pure ATS,
which is FCBD style. From that, people kept asking for the
option to take training from her that they could apply to
their teaching even if they did a fusion style or taught
multiple styles of dance, so she put something together for
them, too. Being her partner, I often teach the General
Skills workshops with her. These workshops are fantastic
because we cover every step and concept in ATS in a 15 hour
course. People are walking away from these trainings with
such a profound revelation of what ATS really is and why,
and they are LOVING it. In fact, it's become so popular
that we are phasing out the regular Tribal Pura workshops to
focus on bringing the GS and Teacher Training to more
locations to make it accessible to more people. We're even
adding a new component called "Tribal Village" which is a
week long intensive that includes both GS and TT with
options for refresher courses for previous graduates. More
details about that will be coming out soon.
7]WHAT ARE THE LONG TERM GOALS
FOR THE PARTNERSHIP & TRIBAL PURA?
We plan to keep working together
indefinitely. We really just want to spread the knowledge
and experience that we have to everyone who wants it. We
also really like each other so it's a good excuse to spend
lots of time together. ;-)
8] WHERE HAVE YOU & CAROLENA
TAUGHT TRIBAL PURA, GS & TEACHER TRAINING? So far we've
taught together all over the US, in Canada, Australia, New
Zealand, Taiwan, England, Finland, Belgium, and Italy. At
the time of this writing I'm in the process of packing for
our 1st trip to Spain and we'll also be going to Mexico this
year.
9] HOW OFTEN DO YOU & CAROLENA
TRAVEL? WHAT IS IT LIKE?
We travel an average of 2
weekends a month. It's both exciting and exhausting. I
always knew I wanted to see the world so it's been a real
blessing in that way. Travelling together makes it much
less stressful and more enjoyable. The challenge for us is
that we both have very active studios and troupes at home so
we try not to be gone more than a few days at time. I
really don't like being away from my daughter for very
long. We tend to do just one event at a time unless we are
flying all the way across the world and there are two
locations relatively close together that we can consolidate
into one trip. It's been so great, though, to see the love
of ATS everywhere we go, and to be able to bring it to
people who can't get to us in the US. We've met some
wonderful people and seen some incredible places. It's been
quite a ride so far.
10] HOW DO YOU SEE ATS
PROGRESSING IN THE U.S.A & AROUND THE WORLD?
It's really heartening to see
the resurgance of pure ATS since we started travelling so
much with it. People are really coming home to it now that
they are learning the true form of it and can see the whole
package. People are seeing that there's a reason for every
movement and every concept and that they don't need to keep
adding new bells and whistles in order to have something
amazing. I think ATS is at the beginning of it's second hay
day!
11] WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE
BETWEEN ATS & TRIBAL?
ATS refers to the style created
and performed by FatChanceBellyDance. Every other style
that branched off it and made changes to it falls under the
category of Tribal. Tribal is such a widely used term now
that it's hard to really give it a definition. Originally
it was used to describe the group of dancers doing what
looked like folkloric middle eastern dance. Now it seems
that everything that isn't Cabaret or Folkloric style is
lumped under the umbrella of tribal. Even solo dancers are
doing "Tribal Fusion", even though they aren't part of a
"tribe" so it's hard to put a firm definition on it now.
Back in the day, Tribal Style was the nick-name for American
Tribal Style.
12] THE LATEST DVD BY FCBD, VOL
7 HAS INCORPORATED SOME OF YOUR NEW MOVES. CAN YOU TELL US
ABOUT THESE?
While teaching and working with
my young troupe in New Orleans I was really inspired by some
movements we learned at a Rajasthani Folk Dance workshop. I
had already fallen in love with Indian art and dance, but
something about this workshop just really sparked the desire
to bring some of those movements into our vocabulary. We
picked the handful of moves that we all really loved and
looked at the viability of bringing them into our
performances without changing the look of what we were
already doing. We worked at them over and over until we had
the perfect mixture of the flavour of the Rajasthani moves
and the structure and integrity of ATS. There were a couple
that just couldn't really work so we had to let them go. We
ended up with the Resham-ka which is a choo-choo variation,
the Sunanda (named for the dancer who taught the workshop)
which is a shimmy variation, and the Water-Pot which is a
turn that comes out of an Arabic Set up. We also took a
commonly used footwork pattern and added an elaborate arm
movement and more contained lower body technique to come up
with the Doubleback.
13] ARE THERE ANY PLANS FOR
ANOTHER VOLUME?
Not at the moment, but who knows
what the future holds. Right now I'm looking forward to
putting together a Devyani performance DVD in the near
future.
Hope you all enjoyed this issue
of Tribal Corner and I look forward to seeing many of you at
The GS certificate and of course Tribal and Trance Fest....YAY!!!!
