By the end of the night I am exhausted and I know that my dancers must be too. I feel guilty for keeping Isabella out so late until I tell her it is time to go home and she begs me to stay longer to practice the fire dance just one more time (and she isn’t even in the fire dance). I leave the studio each night after our rehearsals and look up at the poster that hangs on my studio wall. It is the poster that was from our first performance of “Sheherezade”. It reminds me of the beginning, a moment in history for my career. The first night was so magical and the thought of it still can bring tears to my eyes.

I can’t sleep at night. This always happens the closer I get to a big performance. I haven’t started getting hives yet, but I’m sure they will be on their way soon since it is like a tradition. My chest will break out in a heat like reaction that my dermatologist now calls my “performance hives”. The funny thing is that when I was just a soloist and didn’t have my dance company I never got hives. Gee, I wonder if there is a connection. But with Sheherezade only two weeks away from its return to Los Angeles and San Francisco, my hives are surely around the corner.

The amount of responsibility of a project like this is unbelievable. Since “Suhaila Productions” also produces the show (in Los Angeles we co produce with Leela Belly Dance Productions). I created the show, wrote the script, choreographed the dances, produced the music, designed the costumes, directed the show, and star in the show. So I I guess I feel like I have the right to get hives for sure. But it is labor of love that is like no other sense of accomplishment. The vision for Sheherezade is mine from beginning to end and that makes it even more special. At this stage in my career it makes me so exhilarated to feel my dreams actually come to life.

Eight years ago the dance company was performing at a Lexus Holiday party. We do many corporate events and this was just another one of them. I had planned out a very nice and respectable variety of dances. We performed classical Egyptian, Lebanese style choreography, classical cabaret, Turkish inspired dances, Greek inspired dances, and innovative fusion dances that use Middle Eastern percussion instruments (that we play while we dance) as our music. I must admit that I was very proud of myself for presenting such a wide variety of dances. But as the show began it was very clear that the performances that were more fusion inspired were getting the best responses. The first 5 minutes of a show is always exciting with beautiful belly dancers charging to the stage, so that was an easy gauge. When I got off the stage my husband, Andre, came up to me and said, “Oh I get it, a Western eye is like a child, you have to hold a rattle up and shake it for the entire time”. He was right and I knew it. I felt a little sad since for me if the audience didn’t appreciate my beautiful Um Kalthoum choreography to Lesa Faker, I was devastated. But why would they understand an old Egyptian song by Um Kalthoum. They were Western and with that knowledge I had to remind myself that it wasn’t the audiences that I use to perform for, for a decade throughout the Middle East. Now, I was having to understand the mentality of the future for this dance form and either lead the trend or be left behind. It is exciting to see where this dance form is going. I can only hope that the more audiences see this art form in environments and productions that can give examples to the potential of this ancient art, the more we will be able to have it appreciated by others in the same way our own community does.

It was at that point that I began to create dances that had a theme and more of a “specialty” to them. I wanted to make sure to keep the attention of the American audience as well as educate them. I knew that if I could keep them watching the stage I could secretly slide in dances that would also have a more cultural connection without them even noticing it. It was a challenge to educate them without them noticing.

But I found myself in an even more interesting dilemma regarding the future of my show. If I wanted a show that was totally a creation of my vision, I would have to also envision the music. I did not hear any music being produced that would fit my vision. I didn’t want it to be filled with songs anyone had ever heard before either. I wanted a fresh and totally innovated creation. Nothing was being produced that would match what was in my head. I could hear it and I was beginning to choreography already, but with no sound. That was definitely the next step in my creation of Sheherezade. For a dance to be a creation inside and out, I had to start with the music. So I began my search for the combination of musicians that would also be able to work together in developing a combination of East meets West. Because I grew up listening to both Arabic and American music (equally) I had this sound in my head that I had never heard that was the combination of the two. For me (being born in the 60’s, raised in the 70’s, and an adult in the 80’s and 90’s) I had lived through many generations in both cultures of music. You have to link up the decades in both genre’s and then understand the progression.

Not only did I feel the need to create a sound that would match my vision of the future of belly dance, but I also had to create a visual. I feel that to fuse you must also fuse the costume so I could not just “buy” something already made. This was very exciting since it would allow my mind to explore the creation completely. Movement, sound, and visual was how I imagined my audiences being entertained. In the middle of all that I was determined to educate.

With each new project and vision comes the responsibility to lead in a direction that will have my student’s feel inspired and safe. I often close my eyes and try and think of how directors of major dance companies outside of the belly dance world handle situations like those that I am challenged with. I wake up each day hoping that I will be able to guide my own goals and dreams of taking this dance form to another level. The demands on the students in my dance company are so grand in comparison to other belly dance companies. My technique is difficult and the choreography isn’t easy to learn or execute. With each dance comes the responsibility to strive and push one’s self to the next level making it impossible to be stagnant. And with this demand also comes the emotional demands that any art form can bring up. It is a process for us all involved in the show. The dedication, time, stress, emotional demands, satisfaction, exhilaration, and accomplishment are like none other.

For me Sheherezade isn’t about “me”. I hope that someday the show will go beyond me and have the same chances that Riverdance did for Irish dance. I want this show to live on and that is one reason I created “Sheherezade”. The show is ALL of us. We dance to survive. The dance is the story that lives in all of us that drives us to be motivated and live each day to the fullest. This show should inspire on so many levels but first on the most primal which is to love to the fullest, dance to the fullest, and never ever compromise by allowing yourself to loose your soul. You don’t have to know the story of 1001 nights to understand that. Just allow yourself to get lost in the show and know that the hidden message will take you on a ride that will leave you feeling alive and inspired.

You might not now why, but Sheherezade does.