Established in the early eighties, the NUS Malay Dance was renamed the NUS Ilsa Tari in 1998.
With its new identity, the group aims to stage more challenging pieces.
Under the guidance of tutor/choreographer Osman Abdul Hamid, the People's Association Malay Dance Group's choreographer and Singapore's Young Artist Award winner,
the group performs traditional dances such as inang, ronggeng, zapin, lambak and silat.
It also blends contemporary dance forms - where dancers move with free flow of sharp movements - with its traditional pieces.
This results in traditional and contemporary dance.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Practice 4 :) @
11:09 AM
The other dancers have been training hard while I whisk myself away for a holiday with the family for the first few practices. :) Alas, I know I was going to pay for my absenteeism through the sheer pain my body felt after the end of training. The body has been dormant for quite a while since after DR and everything.
BUT, the steps that have been taught were fundamentally more exciting and more colourful (not literally of course, or else you would see colours coming out from our moves while we dance. okay sidetrack.)
Dancers, okay maybe just me, have always thought that sounds have 8 beats to make it complete. This time around, Cikgu taught us steps that was I call 'The 5 Step', just because I think it sounds creative. I had to get a hang of counting to just 5 and not end it at 4, and I swear it took me forever to get it. The hand just likes to end it at the count of 4!
We learned the "Knee Dance" at the carpark with addition of the night sky and the night breeze to let us be in the mood to be learning the steps. It had a strong feel of martial arts and I felt myself trasnported to the kampong scenes that can be seen from old movies and such. I know, very the drama. HAHA. The moves were fun to execute and it gives me this false security that I can so beat up any person who intends to do me harm. HAH. If only that was true. :)
Finally, back in the aircon studio we practiced our back rolls and it felt easier to do it after having practiced doing it for the productions before. :) You feel like a pro one moment and KABAM! wrong execution. I should stay in reality more often.
Anyways, the whole practice has been captured by our handy-dandy camera and is below for your viewing and practicing pleasure! :)
Established in the early eighties, the NUS Malay Dance was renamed the NUS Ilsa Tari in 1998.
With its new identity, the group aims to stage more challenging pieces.
Under the guidance of tutor/choreographer Osman Abdul Hamid, the People's Association Malay Dance Group's choreographer and Singapore's Young Artist Award winner,
the group performs traditional dances such as inang, ronggeng, zapin, lambak and silat.
It also blends contemporary dance forms - where dancers move with free flow of sharp movements - with its traditional pieces.
This results in traditional and contemporary dance.
