2000 - Saloni M goes South

Josie Palermo history Dance Teaching - Conducting courses/workshops for people at all levels of Middle Eastern Dance. Live Performance / Concerts - Corporate functions, concerts, various theatre productions, including dramatic plays and musicals, appearances at music venues, restaurants and receptions around Melbourne, Fringe Festival shows, Multicultural Festivals at various community locations around Melbourne, performances at various schools and tertiary institutions.

Performances : film - September 1996 - Red Light in Full Flight, documentary about belly dance in Australia; 1997 - Featured extra, Sale of the Century, GTV 9; 1998 - Featured extra, Ocean Girl, Jonathan Shiff Productions; 1999 - performed on Denis Show, 7 Network

philosophy

Middle Eastern dance is an art form that evokes the cultural context within which it was developed. It is fundamentally linked to the emotional expectations of the audience that views it - the dancer becomes a vessel for the expression of emotions that are often suppressed, inaccessible and transient. For a dancer like myself, who is Australian born of Italian immigrants, to learn the dance is to learn the culture, and to interpret that through my own ethnicity as best as I can. What emerges is a style that I am still developing that brings what I know to what I know about Middle Eastern dance. I embellish the movements to embrace a western theatrical style, which leans towards Danse Orientale. The music I use ranges from traditional Arabic songs to the new pop fads sweeping Lebanon today. My movements range from traditional taqsuim danced to the painful straining of a beautiful nay, to aggressive African pelvic movements danced to the beat of a darabekki. What is common throughout is what the audience is guaranteed to feel.

Saloni M night Farid Al Atrash - taqsuim piece Josie Palermo performed to a beautiful taqsuim piece by the artist Eyad Sayya. The taqsuim is the part in the music which denotes special attention to the soloist musician in the band, and it is the dancer's responsibility to adequately portray the depth and range of emotion that the soloist is conveying. Farid Al Atrash is a beautifully rich solo performance of mainly the aoud (middle eastern guitar). It is a solemn, introverted piece.

Josie's dance troupe

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