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FYI… PHOTOS of the SHOW at the BOTTOM

Rachel Brice, Mardi Love & Zoe Jakes are three tribal fusion belly dancers from San Francisco who go by the name The Indigo Belly Dance Company. I’d heard of them before, and my wife has gone to performances & workshops of theirs in the past when we lived in Cincinnati (at least Rachel & Zoe). Anyway, they were here in Eugene for the Oregon Country Fair (actually closer to Veneta than Eugene). Rachel Brice is pictured here (photo credit: Kristine Adams from the Indigo BDC’s MySpace page):

Here are Zoe Jakes and Mardi Love (photo credit unknown):

Well, on to the Oregon Country Fair ~ We braved the heat, the stinky bus passengers, and the heat (yet again) for the Country Fair this year. All around, the Fair was hot but shady (which was a pleasant surprise). It was also expensive, dusty, greasy and stinky. Alas, it’s a country fair in Oregon in July; so that was all expected. :) We came away with a nice table purchase, but that’ll be for a separate blog later.

We had a good time at the Country Fair… we started out with a fun show with the Stage Left Vaudeville Show. It started strong and, well, we left during the “free-style rap” section. Needless to say, it drifted from its big band flair entrance into something that wasn’t our thing. We went on from that to snag some yummy popsicles (Baja Coffee popsicle for me, i.e.- coffee with cinnamon, and Lemon Ginger popsicle for my wife and our friends Chris & Melissa).

We got to the Gypsy Caravan stage around 2pm for the 3pm show of The Indigo. We got there at just the right time… we scored some nice bench seats in the center of the audience. The Gypsy Caravan band was playing… and we saw some good shimmying from Aziza, Colleena (sp?), Claudia, and some other that I couldn’t remember how to spell or pronounce.

Up next was The Indigo… Their backing band was dubbed something along the lines of the Balkan Brass Band / Brass Menagerie (they were made up of several bands). It was interesting to see bellydance to something different than middle eastern music, and I dig Balkan music…

Rachel, Zoe & Mardi did a trio number to start things off. Then Zoe did a solo song, Rachel did a solo (complete with her quite phenomenal “drop move” – see around 1:17 in that video link), then there was a duet of some sort (Rachel & Mardi then Rachel & Zoe, if I remember correctly… likely I’m not remembering correctly). A special guest, Elizabeth Strong, came out and did a fantastic number with a sword. Then the group came out and did a few more numbers, along with Mardi doing a slow moves solo. They danced for about an hour, or slightly under an hour.

Photos of the performance that my wife took are BELOW…

~Dan – np: Charlie Hunter & Bobby Previte – Come in Red Dog, This is Tango Leader

Gypsy Caravan & The Indigo @ Country Fair PHOTOS
all pictures (cc) 2008 emobie,
you may use freely under a creative commons attribution

From the Gypsy Caravan Stage (Aziza, Colleena) & Misc Other Fair Pics

The Indigo (Rachel, Zoe, Mardi, Elizabeth) Pics