Spring Shimmy Madness Workshop Extravaganza
By Ma*Shuqa Mira Murjan
April 1998

Each year Shukriya, producer of the Rakkasah Festival in Richmond, California, held annually in March, also produces a smaller mid-winter extravaganza. This year, the event was rescheduled due to El Nino winter rains and became the newly retitled Spring Shimmy Madness Workshop Extravaganza held in Piedmont, California. The special workshop format of this event features the teaching talents of six local San Francisco Bay Area teachers to provide beginning dancers with the opportunity to expand their reqertoire of dance technique. The teachers for this year's event were: Dhyanis of San Rafael, Alexandria of Berkeley, Jamilla Al Wahid of North Highlands, Anastasia of Millbrae, Siham of Reno, and Jacques Al Asmar of San Francisco.

[workshop details were here]

The evening show was preceeded by another wonderfully catered dinner by Shukriya followed by another opportunity for the workshop participants to shop with the vendors and take advantage of the opportunity to get special advice on costuming purchases that would coordinate with existing pieces.

Then, the shared performances of the workshop participants and the workshop instructors culminated the day. Each workshop instructor displayed thier talents and workshop material in thier evening performance. The workshop participants had wonderful performances and were able to incorporate the dance instruction from the workshops into their own performance. An amazing variety of costuming, music, and personal performance style graced the stage.

A notable performance that highlighted the evening was the unique use of the main auditorium floor with an entrance down the center aisle by Shoshanna. Then, in an exciting to watch acrobatic dance movement, she moved from the auditorium floor with a quick step up onto a chair placed center stage and into a dramatic floor dance pose on the stage itself. Later, during the midst of her stage performance, she quickly danced back down to the auditorium floor using the chair as a dance prop. Fred Astaire would be delighted with her innovative us of props in oriental dance. Shoshanna is a new dancer hailing from Arcata, California - a new center for the origination of excellence in dance at the local college (Humboldt State University).

Many thanks to Shukriya for organizing a wonderful workhsop opportunity for dancers to take class with several instructors, share dance tips and techniques and immediately try new dance techniques in performance. I encourage dancers who want to add a dance learning opportunity to a vacation in the Northern California San Francisco Bay Area to consider including this workshop/performance venue into your vacation plans.

Copyrignt © 1998 Ma*Shuqa Mira Murjan

BACK TO REVIEWS PAGE