In my last blog, I teased you with the possibility of seeing the Uzbek dancing princess—the five-year-old daughter of Aziz Murtazaev, leader of the Marikat/IkatUz Craft Studio ikat weaving artisan group. I’m so excited to be able to share this little video, since Aziz gave his permission to share it with our HoonArts community. (One of our commitments is to always get the permission of people who appear in our photos and videos, as part of our dedication to ethical storytelling.)
I think this video captures the joy and beauty of dance in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. The Murtazaev family welcomed the HoonArts Silk Road Discovery Tour into their home when we visited Margilan in April, 2024 for a traditional dinner of fresh from the garden salads, plov and conversation.
Aziz' daughter, Amina, provided our after-dinner entertainment, which was an absolute delight. We anticipate that Amina's performance will bring an enchanted smile to your face, just as it did to every member of the Tour group.
As I mentioned in my last blog, Amina reminded me so much of my own dancing daughter at the same age. Amina performed several more dances for us after this one. I think she could have gone on all night, if her audience hadn’t felt the siren call of the ikat fabrics in the showroom down the corridor . . .
It’s quite normal for people in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan (especially the women) to spontaneously break into dance whenever family and friends gather and someone turns on the music. You’ll notice that traditional dance in this part of the world involves a lot more intentional use of the head, shoulders and hands than in most Western-style dance. Amina definitely has that down, don’t you think! Enjoy!
And for those of you who might be interested in the "technical" side of our little video, with the help of iMovie and a couple of YouTube "how to" videos, I was able to convert the original vertical portrait mode video (oops! I disobeyed my own rule of "always capture video in horizontal mode") into the side-by-side version you see. The close-up loses a bit of resolution, but I wanted you to be able to see the close-up and the full view. Let me know what you think.
Copyright notice: We've received a note from YouTube that this video can't be seen in some areas because of copyright restrictions. The song that Amina is dancing to, Daddo (tojikcha) (sung by?) Sherzodbek Jonibekov, is protected by copyright in some areas. We'll see about uploading a copy without the music, so everyone everywhere can watch Amina's performance, so stay tuned.
Leave a comment