Belly Dancing Shimmy: Hip Circle

Video Transcript

"Let's put a nice circle in our shimmy. We're going to layer it right on top of that shimmy. My name's Karen and this is Johanna, with Hip Expressions Belly Dance Studio, in Saint Petersburg, Florida. Let's start with our feet slightly apart, and we're going to be doing a horizontal circle, so the pelvis is going to stay flat on the floor. So if you imagine just sort of polishing the floor, if you were to just take your body and set it down, it's going to stay nice and parallel. And of course, you can go either direction with this. So you want the upper body to stay still as you do this move. Make sure everything is pulled in and lifted, and you're going to feel the weight shift around the outside of your feet as you do this. Make sure your head stays nice and still so you can see the movement. Now, let's get our shimmy going and let's do the same thing; we're going to go around, back, side, front, around, back, side, front, and then we can keep it moving. Now, depending on your music, you can adjust the speed and how fast you're going. You want to keep it just going around the outside of your ribcage. You can go the other direction. Remember, you have to keep the shimmy nice and smooth. You don't want to be jerky. You want to be able to count that beat in there. So, practice that in the mirror, and you'll have a nice hip, hip circle shimmy too."