Luscious - The Bellydance Workout for Beginners

For the price, you get what amounts to a 'two-fer': an instructional video--sort of a short form of Neon's "instant bellydancer" series that lasts 50 minutes, and a 45 minute connected workout. The instructional section has Neon's typical focus on proper posture and alignment as well as her wonderful way of conceptualizing the moves. If you've never ever ever bellydanced before, this might require a few watchings to get the moves right, because she's a real stickler on form. It's that focus on form, though, that a) keeps you safe physically (no hyperextending or dangerous twisting) and b) works the deep muscles that show real control and grace. It's worth it to learn how to dance with proper form!

If you already know a bit about dance, jump right into the workout. There's plenty to keep even intermediate level dancers involved--incorporating arm movements, studying how they put together combinations, etc, so don't pass this one up as too basic. It's harder than the BellyTwins stuff! It may take you a time or two to get all the moves down yourself!

The production value, especially for bellydance videos, is high. The dancers are easy to see and well lit, you can see their knees and feet and what they're doing to create the movement. The music isn't too loud or too soft and there's no distracting background.

This video showcases a series of moves and puts them together in short combinations of anything from two to five moves. An advanced dancer could profit from this video studying how they put the combinations together--the interplay of soft and hard movements, upper and lower body movements, and transitions.

Bellydance has lately seemed to bifurcate into the camp that thinks dance should be hard and extreme and damaging on the body--if you're not doing aerial Turkish knee drops, you're a poseur--and the camp that thinks that bellydance is something all women of all ages should be able to do and do safely. Neon is in this latter camp, but her moves, though safe on the joints, are not simplistic. I've seen women struggle with the one-hip figure eight for a long time. So there's complexity here, but a complexity you can achieve with practice.

I think Luscious is a wonderful work out for beginners. I am pushing into my one year in belly dancing, and i found this video informative, creative and simply divine. the music is perfect for each section. I never got bored with this workout because of how each dancer lead the section and the different costumes. My arms and thighs alone burned with satisfaction.

I also found Neon's instruction in the 'step-by-step' section very helpful. This section is great for thoes who do not have any background. For thoes who have background, the section makes a great check and drill.

No matter your size, this workout really works out most of the target areas.

I found this video easy to follow, it explained each dance move very well and gave ample illustration; starting with slow repetitions, speeding up to fast ones. The costumes were gorgeous and the music was good too.

The dancing is a lot of fun. The only thing I don't like is that you can not see the positioning of the feet during the dances. Other than that, I have been "shimmying" away.

I love Neon's dance style: no shimmies, lots of complicated hip movement; fast and very fluid; nothing that would make a dancer feel socially awkward in a club. However, she's too fast for some people, on some of her other DVDs. (I was a professional Pilates instructor for five years--that doesn't mean I can dance.)

In this beautiful, inspiring series of bellydance moves (arms, circles, hips), the movements are done just slowly enough and repetitively enough that a beginner can do them the first or second time through.

The costuming is elaborate, detailed, and perfect for beginners to follow: there is enough of a reflective surface on the hips and chest so that you are able to see the movements really well. The hip belts have points on each side that make it a lot easier to see the hip movements. Even the skirts have slits so that when the dancers kick out a foot, you can see what the feet are doing.

I have a very short list of bellydance DVD's that are appropriate for true beginners: this is on that list, and it's one of the best; it's inspiring, beautifully shot, and easy to follow.