BellyBasics Week13 - highlight

BellyBasics Class Recap – March 6, 2025

Instructor: Nadia Snow

1. Class Intentions

Today's focus was on breaking down new techniques introduced in the choreography over the past two weeks and reviewing key combos to ensure all students are progressing at the same pace.

2. Warm-Up & Body Conditioning

We started the session with our usual warm-up:

• Breathing & Joint Activation: Preparing the body for movement.

• Chest & Pelvic Control: Practicing chest lifts, chest drops, and pelvic tilts, along with isolation drills to allow independent chest and hip movements while maintaining dynamic stability.

• Mat Training: Activating hip flexors and deep abdominal muscles with camel exercises.

  • Neuromuscular Connection for Core Activation: Isolating and controlling three sections of the abdominals:

    • Upper Abs: Engaged through horizontal breathing and diaphragm activation.

    • Middle Abs: Activated by pulling the belly button inward.

    • Lower Abs: Strengthened through external abdominal contractions and pelvic floor engagement.

  • Using the Floor for Resistance: Training on the mat helps students feel and activate different abdominal sections more effectively.

• Camel Movement Breakdown: Transitioning from mat to kneeling, using a visual cue—“folds” on the stomach—to guide movement, rolling from the upper abs to lower abs.

• Standing Camel with Knee Association: Completing the camel movement while standing.

3. Key Technique Training: Shimmy

• Basic Knee Shimmy:

  • Understanding the concept of "knees driving the hips."

  • Keeping the hip muscles relaxed for natural forward and backward vibration.

  • Maintaining a neutral spine and pelvis.

• Advanced Layered Shimmy:

  • Using knee-driven techniques to enable hip and ankle layering.

  • Practicing sideways shimmy and hip circle shimmy.

  • Drilling hip circles with Wahda rhythm to develop rhythmical awareness and accent control.

4. Combination Drills

• Combo 1:

  • 3 Camels + Turn, 3 Camels + Turn

  • Hip Left-Right-Left-Right with Shimmy

  • Hip Circle with Shimmy

• Combo 2:

  • Extracted from the choreography.

  • Practiced to Shaabi music (e.g. La by DYSTINCT and North Coast by Myriam Fares).

5. Advanced Technique: Step with Shimmy on Tippy Toes

• Progression:

  • Step forward and back.

  • Step forward on toes.

  • Shimmy while going onto toes.

  • Final step: Forward onto toes while shimmying.

  • Once students gained stability, directional changes were added.

• This technique was also incorporated into the choreography.

6. Choreography Practice: Habibi Ya Einy

• Practicing all learned techniques and combos with different music.

• Running the full choreography with the official track.

• Students adapted well due to prior drilling with various musical styles, helping them retain the movement better.

7. Class Takeaways & Next Steps

Students demonstrated significant progress in technique refinement, layering, and musicality. Next class, we will continue to polish the choreography and work on performance quality.

Keep practicing, let the rhythm guide you! See you next class! 🧿🦋