Over the course of my 42+ year career, studies and research trips, I have striven to collect all music, steps and styles possible of each dance from many on-site viewings, questions and participation, etc. and to choose a variety of the most typical steps and figures, presenting them in choreography true to their origins, while, hopefully, pleasing to the eyes and ears of the theater public.
As a result, I created my school to teach them and my dance company, the Casbah Dance Experience, especially to show the varied, fascinating and exciting ethnic dance forms of the Near and Middle East, North Africa and the Mediterranean to the general public and give "a bit of home" to North Africans and Near and Middle Easterners in the West.
I've spent over 40 years trying to find, recover, preserve and present them before they disappear, due to modernization and/or fundamentalism. It's a valuable heritage that must be saved from extinction!
To those ends, I hope to continue to perform, teach, research, write and lecture till 6 weeks after I'm dead...
Today, in these increasingly dangerous and stressful times, it is more important than ever that we show the positive aspects of these cultures, in order to create bonds of understanding between our peoples, via their dances, music, etc., which are expressions of love and the universal soul of us all. These aspects - in fact all Arts - are the very things that fanatics and terrorists would like to suppress and eliminate, along with the artists who create, produce and perform them.
We can not allow this to happen and must seek to preserve, honor and present these Arts as often and wherever possible.
Morocco & the Casbah Dance Experience is a non-profit, tax-exempt educational institution under 501 (c) 3 of the U.S. Tax Codes. All contributions are tax- deductible to the full extent allowed by law & are very much appreciated.
Please send what you can to: Morocco/Casbah at 6 West 20th Street, 2nd floor, New York, N.Y. 10011 U.S.A.
USE THE PAYPAL LINK BELOW