BRIDGING WORLDSBeverli BIOGRAPHY
Please click the tabs below for quick-views - otherwise keep scrolling for the unabridged juicy story...
DANCE RESUME
DANCE VISUAL RESUME (video clips)
Beverli's four decades in dance theatre began in ballet with performances from age four, culminating in CAPAB classes under the distinguished Mignon Furman and features at the Baxter Theatre. Jazz training for 10 years with the legendary Dianne Fincham to teacher level included annual eisteddfods and studio shows. Gymnastic training at Gordons (famous for nurturing South African Springboks) aggravated double dislocating knee injuries but her father (being an esteemed and intuitive Western Medical Doctor and Surgeon) left the choice of surgery with 11-year-old Beverli, who was destined for a natural-healing route. Regular dance classes were replaced by training in Chinese Martial Arts supported by weekly acupuncture, which allowed Beverli to train in 3 years of Tai Chi and 7 years of Shaolin Kung Fu under a number of talented instructors at Kim Loong Wushu School in Central Cape Town.
Beverli moved to London in her early 20's apprenticing under Jewelah in yogic disciplines with course materials from a strong Hatha practice even though the Ashram (where Beverli lived for 4 years) had previously been the London base for Yogi Bhajan who founded the modern "Kundalini Yoga" Practice. Jewelah, also a belly dance teacher, broke her foot and sent Beverli to teach all of her classes around London (including many famous gyms and hotspots like Danceworks in the West End). Soon enough Jewelah broke her wrist and Beverli continued to teach classes, as well as completing courses in Herbology and Health and Social Science. Beverli's first belly dance performances (outside studio and community shows held at Jacksons Lane Theatre) began at a small Libyan restaurant in Edgware Road. The Danceworks Studio also introduced Beverli to West End star Colin Charles and his weekly pro classes in jazz aimed at artists auditioning for the famous musicals where she trained weekly. Beverli became assistant producer and coach alongside Jewelah for Belly Dance productions that billed in Central London and Bristol.
A futher foot injury benched Beverli from dance at a point where supportive Osteopathic treatment correcting leg alignments exposed a pinched nerve under her other foot. Beverli took the training schedule gap to begin studying Trapeze, which she pursued for three years in class and theatrically. Coached under Moira Campbell, The Hangar at Pudding Mill Lane was fertile ground for many aspiring to and becoming cast for Cirque Du Soleil. A large percentage of the original knees injury Beverli had endured for 10 years was healing rapidly alongside private Shiatsu massage/coaching and Beverli's personal style of regenerative yoga developing through the healing of her own leg trauma.
Beverli was blessed to be nutured over a decade by a handful of extremely talented and famous master musicians of Arabic music, whom she refers to as her Dance Dads. All three were pivotal in encouraging her to pursue Oriental Dance and deepening her ear to the nuances of Oriental Music. These three great men included master percussionist Ibrahim El Minyawi (Egypt), master Accordionist Sheikh Taha (Egypt) and master Flautist Aziz El Chaabdiss (Morocco) with whom she spent much time after a cancerous affliction had forced him to remove his voice-box and prevented him from continuing to perform. Since 2005, Beverli also started spending larger amounts of time in the Middle East, starting with a festival in Beirut that introduced her to the legendary Diva of Oriental Dance, Amani of Lebanon, who became mentor and coach. Beverli taught at Amani's 2006 festival and across the two years drank in the magic of some of Lebanon's most esteemed theatrical dance choreographers and directors including Mme Georgette Gebara and Franscois Rahme. Travels to Egypt also commenced around the same time and Beverli's natural channeling abilities began blossoming. Between 2007-2010 Beverli spent long sabbaticals in India with Yogi Dr Tripathi of Varanassi and Sri Surash Babu of Kerala, which added two more Yoga teaching certifications to the collection. Beverli was encouraged to develop her healing modalities alongside a deepening Yoga practice and further took the opportunities to train at the dance school of Chidambaram in Classical Indian Bharat Natayam at the foot of the Temple of Nataraja (Dancing form of Shiva) for three years.
Beverli actively travelled the backroads of the Middle East and India (from Nubia to the mountains of Turkey) over a number of years spending time in small villages to naturalise in folkloric dance, custom and the unspoken language of dance history embedded in movement before beginning the permanent move back to her home country, South Africa by 2010 to care for her ailing mother. Teaching nationally, Beverli also began a string of one-woman theatre productions: bills included the Baxter theatre, the National Arts Festival, one production which was booked for a week and extended for the month due to high press acclaim and some shows that featured in multiple cities and multiple countries.
Beverli travelled more into Greece, Turkey and Egypt for teaching and performance bookings as well as further tuition with source teachers including Sema Yildiz, Reyhan Tuzcuz and Randa Kamel and even took a trip to Syria in 2015, despite opening her formal school Al-Masrah Academy of Yoga and Dance on Sea Point's High Street in central Cape Town and nurturing dancers of all levels for ten years on the premises until pandemic closure. Online classes (particularly for professional and teacher level) were offered since 2019 and Beverli spent much of 2020 pre-recording classes particularly for beginner, improver and intermediate level dancers. She also enrolled and completed an intensive course in Iraqi dance with the esteemed Assala Ibrahim, adding workshops with Dandash and Zara to the list of Egyptians icons Beverli has workshopped with over the years (including Baladi/Saidi master Lubna Emam and Diva Aida Nour) and Algerian legend Amel Tafsout.
In South Africa, Beverli has taken positions of resident dancer at Iraqi-owned Al Diwan for two years and Mesopotamia Kurdish Restaurant for 10 years as well as medium to high end weddings and large company event bookings (Central Cape Town, Waterfront, Camps Bay). As a professional coach, Beverli has trained many successful dancers and teachers to industry-readiness. Her classes and courses (always hosted in small focus groups) include teacher training groups, short courses, ongoing weekly classes and fixed-modules-with-open-dates professional-only courses. These courses currently include lecturing and practical modules spanning history/acculturation in Middle Eastern Dance, "Foundations of Dancing with Classical Arabic/Turkish Music" and a Balady Masters course. Further coursework continues to be written and offered as per the demands of the advanced and professional dancers continuing ongoing training with Beverli. New teaching tours are also being set out for South African dancers across various cities through 2021 and 2022.
Dedicating more than half her life to performing and teaching Oriental Dance has been a reclamation of Beverli's Middle Eastern bloodline roots. While she has been nurtured in Jewish folkloric dance as a child, her paternal line is Iraqi (via Lithuania) and her maternal line has a vein of French-Egyptian lineage. Perhaps this powers what many students say of Beverli as an Oriental Dance Teacher, that she "Teaches from her Soul".
Beverli moved to London in her early 20's apprenticing under Jewelah in yogic disciplines with course materials from a strong Hatha practice even though the Ashram (where Beverli lived for 4 years) had previously been the London base for Yogi Bhajan who founded the modern "Kundalini Yoga" Practice. Jewelah, also a belly dance teacher, broke her foot and sent Beverli to teach all of her classes around London (including many famous gyms and hotspots like Danceworks in the West End). Soon enough Jewelah broke her wrist and Beverli continued to teach classes, as well as completing courses in Herbology and Health and Social Science. Beverli's first belly dance performances (outside studio and community shows held at Jacksons Lane Theatre) began at a small Libyan restaurant in Edgware Road. The Danceworks Studio also introduced Beverli to West End star Colin Charles and his weekly pro classes in jazz aimed at artists auditioning for the famous musicals where she trained weekly. Beverli became assistant producer and coach alongside Jewelah for Belly Dance productions that billed in Central London and Bristol.
A futher foot injury benched Beverli from dance at a point where supportive Osteopathic treatment correcting leg alignments exposed a pinched nerve under her other foot. Beverli took the training schedule gap to begin studying Trapeze, which she pursued for three years in class and theatrically. Coached under Moira Campbell, The Hangar at Pudding Mill Lane was fertile ground for many aspiring to and becoming cast for Cirque Du Soleil. A large percentage of the original knees injury Beverli had endured for 10 years was healing rapidly alongside private Shiatsu massage/coaching and Beverli's personal style of regenerative yoga developing through the healing of her own leg trauma.
Beverli was blessed to be nutured over a decade by a handful of extremely talented and famous master musicians of Arabic music, whom she refers to as her Dance Dads. All three were pivotal in encouraging her to pursue Oriental Dance and deepening her ear to the nuances of Oriental Music. These three great men included master percussionist Ibrahim El Minyawi (Egypt), master Accordionist Sheikh Taha (Egypt) and master Flautist Aziz El Chaabdiss (Morocco) with whom she spent much time after a cancerous affliction had forced him to remove his voice-box and prevented him from continuing to perform. Since 2005, Beverli also started spending larger amounts of time in the Middle East, starting with a festival in Beirut that introduced her to the legendary Diva of Oriental Dance, Amani of Lebanon, who became mentor and coach. Beverli taught at Amani's 2006 festival and across the two years drank in the magic of some of Lebanon's most esteemed theatrical dance choreographers and directors including Mme Georgette Gebara and Franscois Rahme. Travels to Egypt also commenced around the same time and Beverli's natural channeling abilities began blossoming. Between 2007-2010 Beverli spent long sabbaticals in India with Yogi Dr Tripathi of Varanassi and Sri Surash Babu of Kerala, which added two more Yoga teaching certifications to the collection. Beverli was encouraged to develop her healing modalities alongside a deepening Yoga practice and further took the opportunities to train at the dance school of Chidambaram in Classical Indian Bharat Natayam at the foot of the Temple of Nataraja (Dancing form of Shiva) for three years.
Beverli actively travelled the backroads of the Middle East and India (from Nubia to the mountains of Turkey) over a number of years spending time in small villages to naturalise in folkloric dance, custom and the unspoken language of dance history embedded in movement before beginning the permanent move back to her home country, South Africa by 2010 to care for her ailing mother. Teaching nationally, Beverli also began a string of one-woman theatre productions: bills included the Baxter theatre, the National Arts Festival, one production which was booked for a week and extended for the month due to high press acclaim and some shows that featured in multiple cities and multiple countries.
Beverli travelled more into Greece, Turkey and Egypt for teaching and performance bookings as well as further tuition with source teachers including Sema Yildiz, Reyhan Tuzcuz and Randa Kamel and even took a trip to Syria in 2015, despite opening her formal school Al-Masrah Academy of Yoga and Dance on Sea Point's High Street in central Cape Town and nurturing dancers of all levels for ten years on the premises until pandemic closure. Online classes (particularly for professional and teacher level) were offered since 2019 and Beverli spent much of 2020 pre-recording classes particularly for beginner, improver and intermediate level dancers. She also enrolled and completed an intensive course in Iraqi dance with the esteemed Assala Ibrahim, adding workshops with Dandash and Zara to the list of Egyptians icons Beverli has workshopped with over the years (including Baladi/Saidi master Lubna Emam and Diva Aida Nour) and Algerian legend Amel Tafsout.
In South Africa, Beverli has taken positions of resident dancer at Iraqi-owned Al Diwan for two years and Mesopotamia Kurdish Restaurant for 10 years as well as medium to high end weddings and large company event bookings (Central Cape Town, Waterfront, Camps Bay). As a professional coach, Beverli has trained many successful dancers and teachers to industry-readiness. Her classes and courses (always hosted in small focus groups) include teacher training groups, short courses, ongoing weekly classes and fixed-modules-with-open-dates professional-only courses. These courses currently include lecturing and practical modules spanning history/acculturation in Middle Eastern Dance, "Foundations of Dancing with Classical Arabic/Turkish Music" and a Balady Masters course. Further coursework continues to be written and offered as per the demands of the advanced and professional dancers continuing ongoing training with Beverli. New teaching tours are also being set out for South African dancers across various cities through 2021 and 2022.
Dedicating more than half her life to performing and teaching Oriental Dance has been a reclamation of Beverli's Middle Eastern bloodline roots. While she has been nurtured in Jewish folkloric dance as a child, her paternal line is Iraqi (via Lithuania) and her maternal line has a vein of French-Egyptian lineage. Perhaps this powers what many students say of Beverli as an Oriental Dance Teacher, that she "Teaches from her Soul".
Subscribe to the News!