A-Z Training

A-Z Belly Dance Training - Information & FAQ's

Devised by Keti Sharif in 1999, A-Z has been an overwhelming blessing to many belly dance students, teachers and performers world wide. A-Z introduces clear, easy to learn, themed sequences from A - Z, so 26 routines to enhance your personal knowledge on style, technique, Middle Eastern rhythms, culture and language.

Each sequence is approximatley 16 beats and focuses on learning the nuance of Middle Eastern dance. A-Z is fun, flexible and accesible. You can learn A-Z by DVD, or through workshops, ideally both.

Certification in A-Z is also becoming really popular as dancers seek to develop themselves with extra support, practice and training. A-Z certification encourages you to do plenty of practice in your dance groups, and as an individual. You'll need a training pack available from Guinevere or Keti and this will give you everything you need to reach the certification level.

Workshops in A-Z are run througout the world. Enjoy being part of this global dance community! Students of A-Z teachers enjoy the structure and developemnt A-Z brings to them and teachers love it for the same reasons! Once learnt, the sequences can be the foundation and inspiration for exquisite, creative belly dance, you will have extra material, confidence and technique to share in performance, classes or your own practice for enjoyment. A-Z aims to give you flow, improve your postural awareness and help you to dance safely.

Guinevere's A-Z workshops are held in Wales at Over The Rainbow Dance Mansion. Guinevere is trained in A-Z Original and Advanced and is a certified A-Z teacher of both strands. She has recently become an A-Z course assessor with Keti as her mentor. Guinevere began her A-Z studies in 2004 during a mission to seek more to share with her belly dance students. She ended up in Cairo on an A-Z Personal Technique course and hasn't looked back since. Although she is now back in Wales!

See the A-Z Belly Dance article in Dancing in the UK magazine 2010

A-Z Belly Dance Training - Baubo Belly Dance Mission Statement -

Here are a few ponits that the A-Z Training aims to bring to students;

PERSONAL TECHNIQUE;

• Empowered, creative dancers
• The ability to breakdown technique for personal use
• Flowing performers and performances
• Ability to consider and portary Middle Eastern culture
• Experience in a range of Middle Eastern Dance styles
• Knowledge in music, rhythm and instruments used in Belly Dance
• Greater dance confidence and enjoyment
• Progressive opportunities

TEACHER TRAINING

• Health and Safety knowledge and professional requirements
• Awareness of and ability to apply a range of learning styles
• Ability to breakdown moves for others
• Skills in choregraphy formation
• Ability to incorporate a range of prop work
• Staging skills, costuming and advanced troupe work

'A-Z has helped me to lay down a foundation of knowledge that I can build on. I feel a
100% rise in my confidence and therefore my enjoyment of dancing is greater.' Rose Barter. A-Z Student.

A-Z FAQ'S - Do I need any belly dance experience to do A-Z?

You can study A-Z belly dance at any level. It's totally personalsied. If you are new to belly dance A-Z will give you alot of basic moves but within the context of creating flow to your dance. A-Z is good for beginenrs as you can learn in small sections and you can refer to the DVD.

Suggested learning material - A-Z Original DVD. A-Z taster w'shops. Regular belly dance classes.

Do I need to have done A-Z Original Personal Technique to join in the teacher training?

Yes, when you become an A-Z Belly Dance teacher you will be teaching the routines that you have learnt during the personal technique course. It is essential that you have been through the process of learning the moves and combinations, worked creatively with them and been assessed as able to perform them.

Suggested learning material - A-Z Original Personal Technique Pack for certification. A-Z workshops.

I have been belly dancing for years, do I have to do the Original Personal Technique course or can I choose to start with the Advanced course?

If you are an establised dancer, the advanced course will be fine. Many of the moves will be familiar to you and you will also enjoy the wealth of new material in A-Z advanced, such as the many travelling sequences, sacred geometry floor patterns, global styles and advanced hip work.

Suggested learning material - If you are a performer with no interest in teaching, go for the A-Z advanced DVD. If you want to go into teaching start with Advanced A-Z Personal Technique Pack for certification and lead onto the Advanced teacher training pack.

How do I get assessed?

You will have a written exam that is a multiple choice format. All answers are in your training manual, so if you've read it, you'll be fine! You also have each sequence from A-Z filmed and sent to an official A-Z belly dance assessor. Sequences are usually filmed in logical sequence and in total flow, back to back. So for example. A-E would be performed as one flowing section of belly dance. Sections are themed so this works really well. A-E is classical belly dance and F-J is folkloric dance and so on.

Suggested learning material - You will only be assessed on the courses that lead to certification. So any certification training pack.

How long will it take to become qualified to teach A-Z Belly Dance?

You can start your A-Z personal training immediatley! Through the home study packs you are empowered to do as much training as you like. Generally the sequences and moves need to be absorbed and practiced over several months at least and additional workshops are useful to focus your training and help move you forward. After certification in personal technique, you then need to move onto the teacher training programme, in a logical step. So, if you've done Original personal technique, you move onto Original Teacher Training. In reality the minimum amount of time would be around 1 year as that gives 6 months for each course. We are all unique though and you may do this much quicker or indeed take several years over it. That's fine.

Can I come and have a taste of A-Z before I buy any training packs or DVD's?

Of course, I will be running more A-Z workshops for certification in Summer 2012. Most of my classes and workshops use A-Z sequences so be in touch if you'd like to join in any sessions and please express your interest in A-Z. There is also a small clip of some A-Z training on my video page - F&G Original routines. Many Belly Dance teachers now offer A-Z Belly Dance in their work so check out the teachers listing here. There are also video clips and extra information on Keti's website.

Guinevere's A-Z Workshops are held at Over The Rainbow, Nr Cardigan, West Wales. She is also able to travel to groups to teach A-Z and share the joys of it with dance groups in the UK and internationally.

All enquries welcome.

guinevere@baubo.co.uk

Tel - 01348-841114 or 0792 533 2892