Sadie's Complete Bellydance Guide

Chapter List:consist of: warm upupper body isolationslowerbody isolationslower body isolations:horizontal and verticalposture and carriage tips on do's and dont'sfigure 8's :horizonal, verticle and variationsundualationsundualations with variationsverticle hip isolations and basic shimmytraveling hip movementsbasic egyptions variations:traveling with hip variations and undulationstraveling hip cirlcles combinations and layering variationschoreography to shake me ya gamalbonus performance: ah ya ZeinYou can go to each one seperately and drill the area you need the most work in.Very well put together. Nice astmosphere. Music fits the moves that she is teaching. The warm up is a drill of basic moves with no muscle isolations. It is a nice length in itself. The whole Dvd is a lot of drilling. For instance I counted how many times she did the figure's 8's(56 counts that is left right= 1 count) that was slow, then she speeds it up another 50 plus counts then she slow is down again for maybe another 30. each technigue is drilled.the shimmy's for any one who has not mastered it here is your chance. she starts off with slow hip movements 60 left 1,right 2 counts she speeds it up a knotch maybe 1-2 more times and each level of speed you are doing the move for about 30-50 counts before she gets to the fast shimmy which she keeps you there for a nice while holding the tempo. by the time you get to the actual shimmy you may be hipped out. I got it now and can hold it.The egyption variations are traveling moves she calls arabic 1,2,and 3. You do undulations, shimmy;s and other traveling moves on rela've as well. There is one move she did that had my hip burning and I was glad she switched to the other side.The undulations variations is going from a upper undualtion to a lower undulation in one move. I looked at but have not practiced the traveling hip circles combinations and layering variations yet. She mentions that many of the moves are not basic moves but she figure now is a good time to learn them. She makes you want to master the technigues. She makes you maintain proper form throughout the dvd. She mentioned also that she designed this dvd to equal an eight week course.She expresses that it is very important to practice as much as you can to train your muscle memory and it is important to stregnthen the muscles. It is a lot on this dvd and for the price you can't beat it at all. I would have paid more for it. I actually paid more than you will if you get it from amazon. If you are looking for a good dvd to get you started and want to learn muscle isolation like Sadie you are in for a treat.I don't give too many reviews but many has helped me not waist my money espcially the one's who do the video clips. I also would like to mention that rather or not something is beginner's or not depends on the person. If you have a dance background like salsa, african and can do the moves in dirty dancing or have taken folk dancing and line dancing many of the same moves are implicated just maybe done slightly different. the two step and three step and the grape vine I learned in a gym class under folk dancing along with other variations that I do not see but plan to use in my own dance style. You will catch on to the moves very easy if you have a dance back ground even if you have never belly danced because you have some dicipline alreay. If you work out doing yoga or pilates muscle isoalations will be easier because you have alrealy learned to control your internal muscles. Your dance style also makes a differnce. if you are a stiff person vs a flexable person who you learn from may make a difference. There are some dvd's that had a lot of good stuff in them but they moved too slow for I got bored. I like it when you keep moving. If you start talking a lot with no movement I will loose interest and never get through the dvd. Hope this helps.

First off let me say the bonus performance was worth the DVD alone.Absolutely wonderful. I wish she had included the choreography to it.Sadie is not the belly dancer to be played with she knows her stuff and she wants you to know it as well.Sadie is a very technical teacher as well. She is teaching you the mechanics of what you are doing, she even shows what you should not be doing. Go figure she herself is a very technical dancer. She really breaks down the movement and you can see everything she is doing.There are no weird camera angles.The Menu is broken down in an easy way to get what you want, no need to go through the whole DVD to get to one section.The choreography is a three part short choreography but you do use a lot of what you learned.She even uses a variety of arm and hand placement. Even the little that she uses is a step up. I have a couple of her DVD's and she is not a fan of hand and arm movements.I recommend this DVD for everyone, even advanced students need to constantly drill the basic. The content is outstanding. This is a very thorough technique DVD. Some of her concepts are nice. Like when she did the upper body movement in something like a sumu squat. Her constant reminders about posture throughout the DVD is wonderful.The about me section is just a brief written review about her.The first reviewer pretty much covered everything,there really isn't to much to say but this DVD is worth the money.To me the magic in this DVD comes from drilling the basics with correct posture. That is when you start to see the Sadie style execution and it can be something that is easily overlooked. Are your knee's bent the entire time? Does your pelvic stay tucked under for all the movements? Sadie stays bent knees for the majority of her movements ,and her pelvic always stays tucked unless doing an interior hip circle. It takes work to transition through movements staying in the correct posture. If you like Sadie style and plan on using her more advanced DVD'S or if you have her more advanced DVD's but struggle. This would be the perfect DVD to get.Doing this DVD with awareness will really take you along way.With that said I usually skip her arms section and drill that with another DVD. Her shimmy section can be troublesome. The shimmy that she does on here looks more like a freeze shimmy as opposed to the bent knee shimmy or the Egyptian shimmy.Not a problem but you may not be drilling the shimmy you want to drill.

Sadie is an incredibly dynamic performer and her demonstrated body control and isolations are spectacular. She is a very detail oriented teacher and can really help assist a dancer learn how to fine tune their movements. This DVD is about drills; practising movements over and over to perfect them and develop good technique. This DVD is not a substitute for taking classes, it is designed to be a companion to classes to help further embed movements that you have already learned in classes. The DVD is designed in sections for working on different movements so you can do as much or little as you have time for. I would recommend this for an intermediate or above dancer with class experience that wants to "polish" their movements. Advanced dancers can also benefit from this drilling and I think the DVD moves along quickly enough to not be boring. Good production quality.

Super dvd, plutôt pour debutantes à intermédiaires. Techniques bien presentées et expliquées en détail. Sadie parle anglais, mais pas besoin d'un niveau extraordinaire pour comprendre ! chez moi le dvd passe sur tout support (console, pc).. j'ai l'impression qu'il est dézoné

Sadie kannte ich durch Youtube und für mich ist sie mit eine der besten Bauchtänzerinnen. Ich war also hocherfreut von ihr diese DVD zu entdecken.Meine Freude wurde allerdings dadurch gedämpft, dass es diese DVD nur in englischer Fassung gibt. Wenn man über 20 Jahre aus der Schule ist hat man Englisch nicht mehr auf der Kette. Aber ich bestellte die DVD trotzdem und muss sagen, dass ich es nicht bereut habe. Sadies Englisch ist so einfach und gut gesprochen, dass ich sehr schnell wieder drin war und dem Unterricht problemlos folgen konnte. Noch dazu macht Sadie die Bewegungen sehr detailliert vor so dass sich eine Erklärung dazu oft erübrigt. Manches ist evtl. etwas schnell vorgemacht, aber da es eine DVD ist kann man immer wieder zu dieser Übung zurückkehren und sie in seinem eigenen Tempo lernen.Was mir aber besonders gut an Sadie`s Unterricht gefallen hat ist, dass sie immer wieder erklärt dass die Bewegungen ausschließlich von den Muskeln ausgeführt werden.Ich hatte einmal Bauchtanz Unterricht bei einer Dame der es egal war wie ich die Bewegung ausführte, Hauptsache sie sah "spektakulär" aus. Dann habe ich eine andere DVD "Orientalischer Tanz - Bauchtanz lernen mit Djamila, Level 1" die auch nicht sehr viel Wert auf die Muskelarbeit legt und mehr wie Ballett anmutet. Noch dazu erklärt sie, dass der Shimmy eine Bewegung aus den Knien heraus ist, was nicht korrekt ist. Man denkt also, die Schmerzen in der Hüfte sind normal. Sadie aber zeigt auf, dass die Beine und Knie keinerlei Einfluss auf die Bewegung in der Hüfte haben und still stehen bleiben (außer bei Schritten).Hier habe ich allenfalls Muskelkater bekommen und einen sehr schön geformten Bauch und Oberkörper. Und auch die Rücken- und Armmuskulatur ist bei mir sehr ausgeprägt. Und dieses sogar in kurzer Zeit regelmäßigen Trainings weil diese Körperpartien enorm beansprucht werden.Diese DVD ist also hervorragend geeignet wenn man seinen Stil verbessern möchte, Bauchtanz von der Pike auf lernen möchte (ohne Haltungsschäden oder ungesunden Bewegungsabläufen)und /oder wenn man seinen Problemzonen effektiv zu Leibe rücken will, bzw. Bodyforming machen möchte.Das einzige Manko ist vielleicht, dass die Musik ab und zu vor Beendigung der Übung aufhört. Aber wenn es mehr nicht ist.....

Really great, very well explaned, very easy english to understand.I suggest to buy this DVD for beginners and intermediate levels

I'm very glad I bought this DVD. I was a bit uncertain having bought another belly dance DVD before that didn't deliver but this one certainly does. It begins with about an hour of warm up exercises that demonstrate necessary positions and posture before moving on to techniques and combinations. The warm up is a little long, however the DVD allows you to design your routine however you like, so you can skip some of the warm up exercises but I wouldn't. I use it to practice during the week and attend a belly dance class at the weekend and it has really helped me to improve. Highly recommended.