I was upstairs in the dressing room at the Bagdad alone and close to tears. One of the dancers was on stage dancing and the other dancer was still downstairs hanging out with friends enjoying her show. I had just finished my second set and was feeling upset thinking about my show. I was so embarrassed at my bad dancing that I just wanted to pack up my costumes and leave but I couldn’t because I still had another set to do. I worked in a club with two other dancers and every night we did 3 shows each, a total of 9 shows a night. There was not as much at stake in the first show, because we dancers and the musicians usually used the first shows to warm up and wait for the house to fill. But the second shows were important because that was when the place was full and we'd don our best costumes and dance our hearts out to really fantastic music because the musicians would be warmed up by then. I really can’t explain what happened to make me want to quit because nothing unusual had happened. There were no mishaps on the stage and the customers seemed to enjoy the show, but somehow everything felt off. Just blah. I felt it was better to do a memorable show, put my feelings out there for all to experience, take a chance interpreting the music differently, bare my soul for all to see...whether great or horrible, that would be a better show than one that was just blah. Blah was safe. Blah was uninspired. Blah was boring. We usually didn't choose the music for our sets because this was dictated by the customers' requests or the musicians whims so it was always exciting to create on the spot. Although many of those moments were amazing when we all connected, some were pretty bad to the point of even being funny when we were unconnected, but it didn't matter as long as it wasn't boring. Sometimes the drummer would take a break during the veil or floor part of the dance and the oud player would play a super long taqsim to kill time until the drummer returned but it really wasn't their fault. In fact when I think about it, those poor musicians never got to take a real break, so out of necessity they would take turns leaving the stage when it was slow.
Anyway, it was one of those nights when there just wasn’t any magic on the stage. To me the show was so off that I was ready to cash it in and call it quits. I felt I couldn’t continue dancing when the musicians and I were so uninspired. We just weren't connecting and I could feel the tears wanting to start running so it would be better to just quit before I further embarrassed myself. But first I had to finish the night because I had promised to not ever quit during or at the end of the night...ever again. Yousef, my boss, had made me promise to always sleep on it and then quit the next day if I still felt the same way because I would often quit when leaving work at the end of the night only to call the next morning saying that I changed my mind. Fortunately Yousef was a musician; he was also a violinist, not just my boss, and he knew and had experienced the same emotional ups and downs that we all went through. I wasn’t the only employee who was so temperamental. It seemed that being passionate and melodramatic was an artist’s curse. Sometimes we were our own best enemies and these tempestuous reactions could keep us from getting ahead.
Middle Eastern musicians and dancers are not just performers, we are also artists in our own right but because of circumstances and because of our temperament and principles many of us can be called poor starving artists. Many of us would not, could not sacrifice for our art; would not be willing to make compromises to get that extra dollar; would not want to denigrate our music or dance. Not wanting to do easy gigs such as bellygrams put our dance in the same level as being a clown or a stripper. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1982/12/06/clowns-balloons-and-dancers-put-new-spin-on-messages/00c88a92-b86b-47b7-8407-899ec1a00b4b/?noredirect=on&ut&uta92-b86b-47b7-8407-899ec1a00b4b/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.02e83d8f993c Bellygrams were entertainment, maybe fun but certainly not culturally significant. Out of necessity some dancers did these types of gigs, but many of my friends and I did not. So we didn't always get those extra dollars that would have helped in buying groceries or paying bills. Sometimes we had a hard time turning down easy money when it came time to paying the rent. We tried hard to follow our dreams of creating for the sake of creating and not for the dollar bill; we tried hard to not compromise our art form, but sometimes it was a hard choice...feed the belly or feed the soul.
Many of us sacrificed for our art. Why? Creating something uniquely esoteric didn't always get understood when we had to satisfy the general public, the public who would walk in off the street and be enticed to stay and buy more drinks. Did it even matter if we created something really great if the public at large only wanted to see skin? This was during the time when we were on Broadway in San Francisco surrounded by topless, bottomless and completely nude clubs. We were isolated in our art but still there was this compulsion to create. Did it even matter? Did anyone even really care? Thank god we had friends and followers who came from that part of the world who understood and cared and that was all that mattered.
In the old days, it was easier to be a poor starving artist. We were all young. Life was cheaper. Life was so less complicated. Back then we did our art, we slept our art and then we did it again. But times change and with it, the economy, the pressures, the lifestyles and becoming American following the white picket fence dream. This new generation of immigrant clientele had the urge to nest and assimilate into the general population. Many put their love of music on the back burners of their minds and hearts and simultaneously the hippies leaving hippiedom began to concentrate on careers and becoming adults. This generation marked the beginnings of the tech culture and the birth of the Yuppies that would lead to the Gen Xers and later the Millennials with ideals and values that would turn the economy topsy turvy. Or as Ahmed Adaweya would say Kulloh alla Kulloh. https://youtu.be/aBbcWtSshGo
Today the musicians sacrifice their economic wealth in work in liquor stores and drive limos or uber so that they can maintain a certain amount of freedom to jump at the chance to make their art. And todays dancers, Gen Xers and Millennials, often sign up for agencies that send them off to do gigs similar to what Eastern Onion,a bellygram agency, offered. But more often than not, todays dancers become weekend hobbyists while really living a life of comfort holding down "real" jobs in the tech or professional world so they can have their cake and eat it too. It has become harder and harder to minimally, barely support oneself as a full-time artist. Poor starving artists are not considered a different category or a generation but there don't seem to be venues that can support the artists, dancers and/or musicians, if they want to do their art full-time. The public at large doesn't seem to be interested unless it is to see and be seen and pretend to be experiencing art and culture through 5 minute pop-up shows at venues that claim to be authentic but are really facsimiles and safe havens for the monied chosen few. The real culture and art is left for the poor starving artists with too much integrity to compromise a dollar for their art. And the musicians' audience usually is of the multicultural variety while the dancers' audience is practically non-existent due to lack of time or funds to support this art. There is just too much bad press and we now seem to only present our art to each other. But is this even true? Here is a little something I found on facebook written by Jill Parker on just this subject:
"Support your local dance scene - Attend Events and really be part of the audience. Stay to see other dancers perform. Go to events where you are not performing to support events. Events are struggling due to a variety of pressures including rising costs of venue rental as well as “Hit and Run” dancers who show up, dance and leave. Or worse, dancers who don’t show up because they don’t see intrinsic value in supporting other local dancers. Bottom Line: Participate in local, regional, national and even international dance scenes."
Although I'm sharing my thoughts now, I myself am from what is known as the silent generation. I'm a "war-baby" (WWII). According to the list of generations, https://www.careerplanner.com/Career-Articles/Generations.cfm I'm a silent generation and according to personality tests, I am INFP (introverted, intuitive, feeling and perceptive) https://www.personalitypage.com/INFP.html I feel I belong to the bohemian and the beatnik generation. I was not a hippie. Many hippies, especially the later hippies of a different generation and war (Vietnam) were the baby boomers and when tired of hippiedom and became yuppies. Some hippies refused to change and, I believe, embraced the more bohemian or beat way of thinking and life. https://www.quora.com/What-difference-is-there-between-beatniks-and-hippies Being a silent generation, being influenced by bohemians and beats, I believe I was of that persuasion.
I wore black, wore boots, painted my eyes black, had long straight hair, loved all things artistic, especially music and dance and carried bongo drums. I guess nothing really changes in my world. I was a drummer wannabe then and still am. Actually the beat of the drums the magic of music is the heartbeat and lifeblood of my soul. And in my universe, I can't conceive that anyone could feel differently.
My very first experience performing in public as a bellydancer was at the Bagdad on Broadway in San Francisco's North Beach. It was to live music - violin, oud, drums, voice. I was there looking for a job to help pay my mortgage and feed some bellies. But when I heard the music and responded to it, I didn't even care if I got paid. The music was payment enough and how I reacted to it was a life changing event. I got the job and fortunately for me, I not only got reimbursed for my art, I also actually found I could pay my mortgage, feed the bellies (I had 3 babies) and even then some. Yes, I got paid enough to even pay other bills such as car and utilities. What more could a person ask for? I had an opportunity to express myself in a way that not only nourished my soul, but also brought joy to others. When I got to know my co-workers, the dancers and musicians, I learned that they too were driven to express their feelings. Sometimes we had bad nights and couldn't be creative and would be driven to tears feeling we did a "bad show" but other nights we not only had great shows, we had them together. Meaning the musicians and the dancers clicked. This is what made life worth living. We were like a family. A marriage looking for and sometimes finding that ultimate moment when we could feed off each other. Today people talk about Tarab and Sultanah. We never did. Those weren't words in the vocabulary then because there weren't academics or educators around to write about and define those terms. But it didn't matter. Because those were just words in a textbook and we were those words in reality and in life.
None of us were rolling in the money; it really was a hand to mouth existence, but the happiness and fulfillment in being able to create more than made up for being a "poor starving artist." And, it is all relative. One isn't poor if one is rich with joy in creating art. So maybe it should just be "starving artist." Yes, in my world we all shared the same urges and desires and that was to create and make art. Making a little money while doing this helped, but was not foremost in our minds while creating. I was a single mother of three babies, two dogs and a couple of cats by this time and was so fortunate that my full-time dance job (6 nights a week) could feed our bellies while feeding my soul. I knew that I could have made more money if I compromised my art, but that wasn't even a consideration.
While I've spent 50 some years having fun feeling fulfilled by dancing, playing music and creating shows we artists are still struggling. I've been fortunate being able to merge my work with my play, my creativity, and I've certainly had my share of sacrifices in order to maintain my integrity but I've never really had to compromise to continue my art. Yes, it's difficult to be a "poor starving artist," but in the final analysis, at least this artist is very rich with dreams and desires fulfilled now and yet to come. I hope this can be an inspiration to others. Follow your dreams and the rest will follow.
Amina at Bagdad - This may seem like a bit long by today’s standards. Notice how the drummer magically disappears to take a break during the slow part of the dance. While the music is beautiful, I felt we just were not connecting.
Amina at Bagdad Just more of the same.
Amina recreating a scene at the Bagdad - This is me in a show in the 80’s showing what it was like to be inspired in the 60’s. I never told the musicians I recorded this memory.