7 Day Residency with Show

PURE Reflections: Beauty Reimagined is a theatrical dance story about body image and the journey to self-love and becoming whole. See photos from the 2013 show. Watch 2013 video http://youtu.be/CL9qfCuwVqM. Watch short documentary from the 2010 show in Japan https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjZzP6HwT8g (Requires Kaeshi Chai plus director) This show has been performed in New York, Connecticut, Orlando, Japan, Taiwan, and is booked for Mexico in 2014.

Bellyqueen Teacher Training

Deepen your practice and understanding of bellydance with this 17 hr training. This course is ideal for serious students, current and aspiring teachers. Learn effective tools for teaching, classroom organization and visual, auditory and kinesthetic cueing methods so all types of learners are reached. Learn which stretches are most important for bellydancers in warm ups and cool downs for safety and injury prevention and Bellyqueen's foundation movements. Find out more...http://bellyqueen.com/events/2014-01-17

PURE Procession 

5 hour workshop, plus 2 hour procession through local city
Learn the choreography that unites all PURE chapters internationally. Discover how to listen to yourself to find your breath and to tune into your fellow dancers. Learn sacred circle dances from Eastern Europe and create a giant dance spiral creating synchronized formations. (A minimum of 6 people is required to create the patterns for this choreography.)
Watch video: http://youtu.be/yjmKnRGIbjo

Bellydance Fans 

2-3 hours
Fascinated by fans but don’t know how to use them? Then come and discover how the beauty of fan dancing can enhance your ability to mesmerize an audience. Kaeshi will teach you different hand holds, dramatic accents, poses you can strike, travel steps, plus a myriad of bellydance movements that work well with traditional Chinese fan technique. Appropriate for 12 inch fans with 5-12 inches of fabric hanging off the edge. Please bring your own fans to the workshop. (If you don't have any, extra fans will be available for purchase.)

Turkish Choreography 

2-3 hours
9/4 The Ladies – Kaeshi will teach a challenging and engaging choreography to the song "9/4 The Ladies" by the wildly popular Brooklyn based band, Balkan Beatbox. She will explain how to listen and clap to the famous 9/8 rhythm from Eastern Europe. She will explain the difference between the Roman rhythm and the Karsilama rhythm and will teach Turkish folkloric and gypsy dance steps and gestures along with their meaning. This choreography covers many popular Turkish movements including, basic Turkish step, pelvic drops, grapevines into hops, box step, drunken sailor, heel in the mud, fist hits, and how to execute a Turkish drop. (Optional use of finger cymbals)

The Tao of Veil 

2-3 hours
Explore the expansion and contraction of the universe with the veil and incorporate in primal movements that echo the inhalation and exhalation of breath and the cycle of life.

Kaeshi will begin with a short discussion about the nature of the universe and will introduce a myriad of graceful, lyrical arm patterns inspired from contemporary dance and tai chi. Then she will teach multiple innovative and dynamic veil tricks. The students start under the veil, carve out shapes with their arms and emerge out like a butterfly from a chrysalis. 

Snake Priestess 

2-3 hours
Become a serpent and learn the Tribal Fusion choreography to the song Filii Neidhardi by Corvus Corax. Tribal moves you will learn include: Satellite, Maya ¾ shimmy, Tribal turn, Egyptian basic, Torso Rotation, Taksim, Arabic, Cobra circles and some unique Kaeshi creations movements including the bow and arrow turn, slinky, death dive, small, medium, large Lotus arms and more. See the choreography http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXB5wZwMoWU (for sponsors eyes only)

Bellanova 

2-3 hours
Learn an innovative flamenco-Tribal-fusion choreography to Beatbox Guitar's song "Bellanova".

Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway

3 hours
As a performer there are fewer things more terrifying than improvisation. It requires trust in yourself, trust in the audience and, if you're performing to live music, trust in the band. In this workshop will we will put you on the path to mastering your fear and embracing the joy of improvisation. Find your voice as an artist, learn tools to refine that voice and add the spark of improvisation to your life on and off the stage.

Students will practice listening skills and apply them to improvised live drum solo phrases and recorded music that has been selected to express a range of emotions and dance styles. No two dancers, or shows, are the same so we'll explore a range of moods! Learn strategies for dancing with, and against, the music. Explore the power of humor and connecting with the audience. The workshop will culminate with the students new skills applying their new-found skills in the iPod Shuffle Dance Challenge!

The End Again 

2-3 hours
The End Again Gypsy Fusion Choreography Learn Kaeshi’s fiery gypsy fusion style with step-by-step break down in technique and combos culminating in an enthralling choreography to Beatbox Guitar’s beautiful song “The End Again”. (Bring a full skirt.)

Combo Platter 

3-6 hours
Learn 3 combos in the styles of Oriental, Fusion and Gypsy from Kaeshi Chai who is renown for her versatility as a performer and instructor. Kaeshi draws upon her extensive experience performing internationally for all walks of life in many different venues to bring you a workshop that will also enable you to effectively reach your audience by learning how to modify your dance style to suit each unique situation. By the end of this workshop, you will have greater confidence with how to tackle a variety of performance opportunities.

Alf Leyla wi Leyla 

2-3 hours
Dynamic Egyptian choreography to one of the most famous bellydance classics.

Trans-discipline drills 

1.5-2 hours
This worskhop is designed to train bellydancers to become more versatile and have the tools to be able to flex between Oriental to Fusion, and have the skill set to create long, graceful lines for large stages as well as a varied stationary vocabulary for more intimate settings. It begins with a thorough warm up incorporating yoga stretches, ballet and pilates exercises, and progresses to layered shimmy and isolation drills, turns, traveling steps and improvisation. Please bring finger cymbals.

Performance Skills 

1.5-3 hours
Learn how to express your authentic self with an audience exploring a variety of inherent and unexpected emotions inside and outside the belly dance movement vocabulary to create a compelling message using your imagination for a riveting performance. Learn how to expand your presence to connect with an audience as well as different methods to improvise with confidence. Appropriate for dancers of all levels and styles.

Unleash your inner demon and goddesses 

1.5-3 hours
The Goddess evokes compassion, serenity, love and joy. The demon evokes anger, manipulation, and wild animalistic behavior. Over the past 5 years, Kaeshi has explored these characters in depth through portraying Pandora with Bellydance Evolution, a demon and ocean spirit in PURE Reflections and an Apsara, a flying celestial heavenly being in Bellyqueen’s Silk Road show. She will lead the exploration of light and dark characters in a safe environment by varying your gaze, muscle control and intent and learning moves and combinations from both worlds.

Poses Galore 

1.5 hours
Bored with using the same poses over and over? Learn 36 arm positions and 18 leg positions that will give you over 20,000 new options to add to your dance tool kit and learn patterns to seamlessly transition between them.

Stage makeup 101 

2-3 hours
Struggling with false eyelashes? Come learn from veteran stage performer and award winning illustrator and designer, Kaeshi Chai. This workshop is useful for beginner to professional dancers who want to look their best during hafla or special performances. Transform your face into a work of art so your expressions read from a distance and your natural beauty is enhanced using eye shadows, blush, glitter, bindis, and much more. Witness Kaeshi Chai's 30 minute stage makeup routine first hand and try some of her methods out under her guidance. The double-winged liner look will be featured in this workshop.

“Loved it! Left looking like a beauty queen!” – Dalia Carella
“As an absolute beginner to stage make-up, I found it overwhelming… Kaeshi’s workshop eased my apprehension.” – Qi Zhou
“I loved the handouts that had details of products used in class. Kaeshi teaches in such a clear, organized way that is easy to follow and understand. We are looking forward to the next makeup workshop.” – Marie Richardson
“I recommend this workshop for anyone from novice to the expert. Kaeshi simplified the application techniques and took the intimidation out of it.” – Nahla

Get Funky with Bellydance Hip Hop 

2-3 hours
Funk it up Fusion Combos Add some funk to your bellydance with moves straight from New York City. Learn dance moves that you can incorporate into your personal style that encompasses slow and gooey moves to sharp and powerful accents.

How to Create Dynamic Group Choreography 

2-3 hours
Discover new methods to approach floor and movement design. Create innovative, engaging group numbers for you and your team to capture and mesmerize your audience. Learn to use and vary space, quality of movement, beat, phrases and improvisation.
Exercises will involve creating an individual combo, teaming up with a partner to learn each other’s combos, and teaming up again in a quartet to create dynamic floor patterns. Concepts such as opposition, reverse, inversion, mirroring, level changes, facing, use of peripheral vision and high impact group shapes will be explored.
The Liz Lerman critical response feedback model for effective communication and constructive feedback to help fellow dancers advance their pieces to the next level will also be shared.