By Julie Bauer, Staff Writer
Belly Dance Circle presented its 10th annual nontraditional dance fall performance as a tribute to Aretha Franklin, titled “Il Rukus,” on Nov. 18 in Weber Chapel Auditorium.
“One of the challenges we face is deciding a theme for our fall performance, as it is non-traditional music,” said senior Aiyona Hayman. “We chose Aretha this year … because she was an iconic role model who had recently passed away and was worth celebrating.”
The dance performance opened with Franklin’s “Think” by Level One, a smaller group within Belly Dance Circle consisting of the group’s newest members.
Level Two, consisting of more intermediate dancers, accompanied Franklin’s cover of “Rolling in the Deep.” Before breaking off into solos, Level Three, the group’s veteran members, performed Franklin’s “Chain of Fools.”
“I think people parallel belly dance to stripping in a lot of ways because they just don’t want to learn the culture,” junior Wynn Phillips said. “I hope our audience really took away some of the history of culture and cultivation of styles of dance globally, but also nationally.”
The first soloist was sophomore Joanna Messineo with a performance of “Spanish Harlem.” The second was Phillips with a performance of Franklin’s “The Weight.” The last soloist was Hayman, who performed “Say a Little Prayer.” “It’s extremely empowering to get up on the stage with a group of talented people who all support each other,” Hayman said. “As someone who improvised for my solo, nothing is better than going out and dancing freely, from the soul and hearing [support] from an engaged audience.”
Messineo, Phillips and Hayman also danced together to Franklin’s cover of “No One.” To close the performance, all members of the club came together to perform Franklin’s first number one hit, “Respect.”
“Every single time a member of our club came off stage after their performance, their smiles said it all,” Phillips said. “Our dancers left it all out on the stage and I really think it was received well.”
Phillips continued to emphasize the importance of educating the community at large about belly dance.“
One of the biggest challenges but simultaneously most rewarding parts [of preparing for a performance] is that our club’s community teaching style reflects the early culture roots of belly dance,” Phillips added.
Both belly dance participants and audience members also emphasized the themes of body positivity in the tribute performance.
Sophomore audience member Samuel Emmanuel said, “I had never associated body positivity with belly dance, but I saw that [at the performance] and appreciated it.”
Phillips also noted how belly dance helps her deal with her chronic pain.
“I wanted to find an activity that was active, but not too high impact, that I could really put myself into and belly dance just seemed like the right choice,” Phillips said. “There are many, many days that belly dance is very hard and even painful for me, but being able to learn moves at my own pace with the help of other members and to be able to slowly grow my ability has made the world of difference to me as a person.”