Other Arm Movements

Other Arm and Hand Movements and Poses

This page has a collection of various common poses and movements of the hands and arms that don't fit anywhere else.

Lebanese Headache

Using the same basic position of Indian hands, place your pointer finger in the middle of your forehead with your palm

up. It doesn't necessarily imply you have a headache that's just a cute name.

Pointing

Simply point where you want to draw attention. For example your doing a 4/4 hip shimmy, raise your arms gracefully

above your head then drop the hands downward and point then slowly

lower your arms while still pointing till your finger is just hovering above

the hips. this draws the focus down into the movement adding emphasis

and making the movement more dramatic. You can also point for emphasis

in a song. For example in 'Ya nour el ein' by Amro Diab you can point to

the eyes to emphasize the chorus of "habibi ya nour el ein" or "my darling

you are the light of my eyes." Many people do not recommend pointing at

audience members but it can be a cute way to make the audience feel part

of the show to point at someone when a song says habibi.

Turkish Head Frame

Place the backs of your hands together so that your palms are facing out

now keeping hands facing the same directions place palms together. Then

raise arms over head. You can keep the backs of the hands together or you

can separate them a little to give it a more crossed arm look. See the video

for "Temple Arms" it shows the latter variation.

Turkish Head Frame 2

Place palms together and raise arms over head. It is common to see

dancers bring their palms together as if they were praying at the hip or

waist level and then to raise the arms slowly in front of the body until they

are overhead. This gives a dramatic effect. It's often used when a dancer

wants to show spirituality and is frequently used in pharonic and goddess

dances. See the video for "The Turkish Move" to see this.

Heart

This is a pose you do when you want to emphasize how much you love

something. You can accomplish it simply by cupping your hand under your

left breast. You can use either hand but usually it's done with the right hand

reaching across the body.

Pyramid Head Frame

Touch the tips of your middle fingers together and then touch the tips of your thumbs together. Your hands should

now resemble the outline of a pyramid or triangle. Now, raise your arms

over your head.

Basic Arms

Place left arm out in front of you creating a horizontal line in front of your

chest and curve your right arm over your head. This is often used in

conjunction with basic Egyptian alternating which arm is in front. It is

also a very common position of the arms for Egyptian Saidi style

bellydance. See the video for "Saidi Arms" to see this demonstrated. Other

variations are to Place the lower arm out to the side instead of out in front.

The side variation is especially common if your moving to the side in which

it sort of points your way. The arm can also alternate between these two

positions which works well when doing forward backward alternations or

forward sideways alternations.

Soul

This is a pose you do when you want to emphasize how much something touches your soul or moves you in a spiritual

way. You can accomplish it simply by cupping your hand over your lower abdomen (generally closer to your side as

opposed to the center).

Head Frame

Clasp your right elbow in the palm of tour left hand and keep the right arm in a fairly straight vertical line. Keep the

left arm in a fairly horizontal line. You can also point your finger back and actually touch your forehead like the

Lebanese headache which works especially well when doing movements

like a hip push to the back and looking back towards the movement.

Beshkan (Persian Finger Snap)

Place the palms together. Now twist the hands so that you can tuck one

thumb under the other hand. The fingers should line up with each other still

(i.e. pinky to pinky, ring to ring, middle to middle). Clasp the other thumb

down on the knuckles to put pressure on the pointer and then attempt to

snap the two pointer fingers. When done correctly this produces a very

loud snap which sounds almost like a pop. This is very common in Persian

and Iranian dances. It takes a lot of practice to get just right and you may

need to work on strengthening your fingers and increasing their flexibility

to do this properly. don't get frustrated if it doesn't come quickly.