Product Description

East Coast Tribal bellydance blends sensual, fluid movement with sharp percussive accents evoking the flair of urban modernity. It resonates with exotic echoes of the world's ancient dances and bears a touch of the dark cyber-age mystique. The East Coast Tribal Bellydance instructional and muscle-conditioning program is designed by Sera, an acclaimed performer of Tribal fusion bellydance, and sought-after instructor with a superb systematic and effective teaching method. Sera's primary form of creative expression is through Tribal styles of belly dance. Her movements are rooted in Tribal Fusion Bellydance, drawing from ballet, modern, jazz, hip-hop, and ATS (American Tribal Style) to make the blend she calls East Coast Tribal. Sera's Warmup and Drills programs combine fluid movements and percussive hipwork of bellydance in a way that promotes muscle strength, tone and elongation - the basis for a beautiful body line and effortless grace, both in dance and in everyday life. These sections will take you though series of upper and lower body isolations, help you ingrain in your muscle memory the precision of bellydance technique, and develop muscle control that will convert into a mesmerizing fluid dance as you are learning the East Coast Tribal combinations. The step-by-step instructional section breaks down essential bellydance movements and assembles them into 6 combinations. The combinations can be practiced and performed individually or as a whole. They come together into a seamless choreographed sequence with a wonderful flow of energy and an amazing expressivity. DVD CONTENTS: * Warmup (20 min.) Sera & Solstice Dance Ensemble * Hipwork drills (10 min.) Sera & Solstice Dance Ensemble * Combinations Demonstration & Practice (5 min.) -6 combinations performed as one dance sequence Sera & Solstice Dance Ensemble * 6 Combinations: Step-by-Step instruction (45 min.) - Sera * Performance by Sera (5 min)

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #40305 in DVD
• Released on: 2006-10-16
• Rating: Exempt
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Colour, DVD-Video, Widescreen, PAL
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .15 pounds
• Running time: 85 minutes

Review
This instructional dvd is for tribal FUSION bellydance which incorporates influences from other genres of dance, such as hip hop and modern dance. Although it shares many features with American Tribal Style (ATS) bellydance, do not expect to find it here. What you will find are really unique and skillful movements along with a killer strength training workout. Tribal Fusion involves a lot of technique and skill and is very muscle-oriented. Sera effectively teaches new and interesting combinations that you can use along with your own bellydance style. The instruction is clear, the moves are awesome, and the work-out is great. This is the future of bellydance. --amazon.com (US)

Review
have been bellydancing for 3.5 years (Egyptian and Turkish styles) and take a 1.5 hour Intermediate level class each week. This is the first Tribal DVD I bought, but it is one of the BEST bellydance videos I own now. The 20 Warm up and Isolations and 10 minute belly dance hipwork drills were excellent for warming up the body and teaching flexibility and isolation. I liked that the Solstice Dance Ensemble dancers showed you the side views while Sera showed and explained the front view, so you have a better chance of doing the exercises correctly. I felt like I was doing belly dance warm up exercises as opposed to boring, normal stretches. Each sequence really helped warm up various parts of the body. Just doing those exercises is a good workout in itself! For the dance routine, they showed the whole routine, then Sera broke the routine down into 6 combinations over 45 minutes. I thought Sera was a good teacher the way she broke down the steps, explained, demonstrated, then layered other movements on top until you were doing a combination. For example, she may first show you the steps, you practice the steps, then add the hips. She shows you the rib slide and circle, then you add that to the steps and hips. Oh yes, don't forget the arms and hands. Then you put it all together - ta da! For a beginning belly dancer, I think this DVD would be difficult - I found it challenging as an Intermediate student. I think this is worthwhile for every level of dancer though. You will increase your flexibility, isolations, strength, and really learn some great combinations. I liked all the arm and hand work - you will learn some beautiful, graceful, sensuous motions in this DVD. After the doing all the exercises on the DVD (several times, I wasn't sure if I was going to make it through without having to pause the DVD) plus dancing along with her other performance, my entire body felt flexible, limber, loose, and just GREAT! This is after 9 hour work day of sitting and working at a computer too! I love this video and would buy other Sera belly dance videos now. --amazon.com (US)

About the Actor
SERA is a full time teacher, performer at various venues in New York City, and director of Solstice Dance Ensemble. Sera produces a popular monthly event in New York called New Moon, which features Tribal performance and the band Djinn. Sera has been a member of three nationally respected dance troupes, Bellyqueen, Raqs Sahara, and the Silk Road Dance Company, and is the former artistic director of Transcendance Tribal and a founding member of DC Tribal. In 2005, Sera went to India to teach dance as a means of healing and empowerment to young women rescued from sexual abuse. Sera strives to push the boundaries of definition of belly dance, and seeks to cultivate environments and events which encourage dancers to use belly dance as a tool for creative expression transcending formal presentation and physical skill.

Customer Reviews

Very nice combinations, for beginners of tribal style (but not for absolute belly dance beginners)
i'm on belly dance class for 1 year and am a beginner with tribal belly dance.
Sera explains in a very comprehensible way the movements step-by-step. - the combinations are nice to look upon, but not to hard to learn with a little bit of practice.
the basics are easy to understand and the 6 shown combinations result in a nice choreography.
There are enough lessons to spend some time with this DVD.

It's pretty easy to understand even for Non-native-speakers - she speaks without any slang in a calm way.

only 4 stars because the choreo is done with her ensemble (all in all 4 girls) and the camera angle changes quite often. So you get easily confused when trying to focus on the teacher.
This is only the case with the choreo - the step-by-step explanations of the combinations are just with Sera with a fixed camera angle.

Interesting moves
DVD gives detailed and very effective workout, also example of the choreography with detailed explanations for every movement. The level itself is advanced enough that someone who is versed in other dance style can enjoyed it.
Some of the exercises helped me to improve my flexibility and enrich the choreography of my dances.

excellent
excellent belly dance instruction from a tallented dancer, easy to understand and well thought out.

not perfect, but pretty close