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Traditional vs Modern: Preserving the Roots of the Dance (S05 Ep76) · ZoukNerds • Learn | Build | Belong

0:00
If I were to describe to someone what is Brazilian Zook, I would
0:02
say Brazilian Zook is a Brazilian partner dance inserted
0:06
in the context of other Brazilian partner dances.
0:09
It's a very complex dance, it's a very intriguing dance and it's
0:15
forever evolving dance. It's a Brazilian dance, but it
0:19
has a name from another place and the majority of songs we
0:23
dance to are also not from Brazil, so it's a very strange
0:27
dance. The pros and cons of being so
0:31
open and flexible that sometimes people can interpret in a way
0:37
that maybe goes too far. President Zook grew beyond the
0:41
borders of the country more than any other part of this.
0:44
It has become an environment where the Zook addicted people
0:50
gather. It's not necessarily this place
0:52
where people from all ages and cultures feel like they can just
0:56
walk in and have fun. It is something that I think the
0:58
community should reflect and think about.
1:01
How can we make it more inviting for the general crowd?
1:04
Because let's be honest here guys, we're always looking for
1:08
ways to grow the community. Let's be honest.
1:14
What are we really trying to preserve when we talk about
1:17
Brazilian Zook? Is it just a list of moves, or
1:22
is it a culture where everyone feels like they belong?
1:27
If the music stopped, would we still see the essence of the
1:31
dance? Well, let's find out.
1:35
Hello. Hello everyone, and welcome back
1:37
to Zook Nerds. In this episode, Guy and I talk
1:41
about what Brazilian Zook truly is.
1:45
We look at how musical influences changes, how we move,
1:49
the intriguing story behind why we call it Brazilian Zook, and
1:54
why today's community might feel less welcoming than it used to
1:58
be. Let's look beyond the steps and
2:01
find the real spirit of the dance.
2:05
So let's go. Hello.
2:15
Hello everyone, my name is Alison Sanji and let's welcome
2:18
back our beautiful Co host GI Prada.
2:20
Hello. GI.
2:22
Hello, Alison. Hello everybody.
2:24
Welcome back to Zook Nerds. That's right, everybody.
2:28
And today we have one of those episodes, one of those episodes
2:34
that we are a little bit nervous to talk about, but at the same
2:39
time, we think that it's very, very important.
2:43
And today we're going to be talking about what is Brazilian
2:47
Zook. Just a heads up here, this is
2:51
not what is Brazilian Zook in terms of a history lesson.
2:55
So we're not going to be covering how it started and how
2:58
it evolved, but what we want to focus on today is this
3:03
conversation that happens online every now and then, which
3:08
questions what is and what is not Brazilian Zook.
3:14
For example, what is a good representation or a true
3:17
representation versus something that people may look at and go
3:22
like, well, that's not Brazilian Zook, that's not part of the
3:25
culture, that's not part of the history.
3:28
That's what we're going to talk about.
3:30
And if you've been online in the last few weeks, you may have
3:34
seen that things have happened and because of that, a certain
3:42
movement and conversation started online.
3:45
And that's why we want to have this discussion here.
3:49
So key for you as a person first, maybe we'll talk about
3:54
professional and teacher later. But as a person, as a dancer,
3:59
what is Brazilian Zook and what does it bring to your life?
4:03
And what represents Brazilian Zook?
4:05
How would you describe to somebody what is Brazilian Zook?
4:12
I liked the last bit of a question better.
4:15
How would you describe what is Brazilian Zook to somebody that
4:19
is asking? And this is actually pretty
4:23
challenging because we can think about Brazilian Zook as the
4:27
dance itself. So then we can consider what are
4:31
the movements of Brazilian Zook, what are the characteristics,
4:35
movements of the dance? We can think about the dance as
4:40
an environment, like what goes in the place where people are
4:44
dancing Brazilian Zook, you know?
4:47
But if I were to describe to someone what is Brazilian Zook
4:50
in a very the most straightforward way that I can
4:53
think about, I would say Brazilian Zook is a Brazilian
4:57
partner dance inserted in the context of other Brazilian
5:01
partner dances. So it follows similar qualities
5:06
that other Brazilian partner dances have.
5:09
And I think the main quality of a Brazilian partner dance, when
5:13
I think about me growing up in Rio, when I think about me
5:17
learning more intensely a lot about several partner dances.
5:24
The main characteristic of a Brazilian partner dance for me
5:27
is that in the environment that you go to dance one of these
5:33
dances, you will find people of all ages.
5:38
You will find an environment where You Can Dance the whole
5:42
time or you can sit the whole time, or you can have a
5:45
conversation and dance. So it's a socialization
5:50
activity. And consider that Brazilian Zook
5:53
is inserted in this bigger context of other Brazilian
5:56
partner dances. I would say that it's a dance
6:01
that has in its core characteristics elements that
6:06
are common to other dances. We dancing the embrace, we dance
6:11
outside of the embrace. We have focus in the lower body,
6:16
so hip movements, footwork, legwork.
6:20
We travel. It's a dance that travels, and
6:24
it's a dance that when you watch it, you can easily identify and
6:30
easily differentiate from the other dances at the same time.
6:35
If you watch the basic of Brazilian Zook, the back and
6:38
forth basic, and you watch the basic of Bolero, and you watch
6:41
the basic of Fajar, and you watch the basic of San Giga
6:44
Fiera, you see some similarities.
6:47
So you see how they influenced each other.
6:51
So I think I would start more objectively speaking in
6:55
describing Brazilian Zook in this way as one of several
7:01
Brazilian partner dances inserted in a cultural context
7:05
that has the social dancing, the gathering to social dance as its
7:10
main feature. You know, it's not by definition
7:14
a competition dance. It's not by definition a dance
7:18
that you have set standards in how you execute it.
7:21
It's a dance that is for you to go somewhere and dance with
7:25
somebody that has a lot of experience and there's somebody
7:29
that is just starting. So inviting you to be more
7:33
adaptable, invite you to be more social and what else?
7:39
Yeah, I think I'll start there. I would also say that it's our
7:44
most peculiarness. It's our strangest form of
7:49
partner dancing because if you think boleru, samba fahawa, so
7:54
ching, samba hawk, siftanerju, we dance the dance to songs that
8:01
we make. We do P0 music.
8:04
If you don't know what P0 is, go look it up.
8:07
It's amazing. We dance samba hawk to samba
8:10
hawk music. Somebody get fiera to samba
8:12
music, bolero to bolero music. And then Brazilian Zook is a
8:16
dance that has a name that is not ours, and it got the name
8:22
that is not ours because of a music style that is also not
8:26
ours. So Brazilian Zook is this very
8:30
interesting dance in the array of Brazilian partner dances,
8:34
because we were dancing a dance Lombard into a song, into a
8:40
style of music that was Zook. And then we started to call the
8:44
dance Zook, but then to differentiate it from the
8:48
Caribbean Zook, we start to call it Brazilian Zook.
8:51
So it's a Brazilian dance in a Brazilian partner dance context,
8:55
but it has a name from another place.
8:57
And the majority of songs we dance to or that we used to
9:02
dance to are also not from Brazil.
9:05
So it's a very strange dance. How would you describe it as
9:11
soon? Well, I think that's a very,
9:14
very great start. And this almost leads us into a
9:19
whole other episode, which is like, is Brazilian Zook the
9:25
right way to call this? Shouldn't we just call it
9:28
lambada? But guys, have a seat.
9:32
Let's not get too excited about this.
9:34
We can talk about this another time.
9:37
Now, to answer to your question, what is Brazilian Zook?
9:41
I think I would start very similar to what you mentioned,
9:45
and then I would take it a little bit more on my personal
9:48
side. What is Brazilian Zook to me as
9:51
a person? To me, this dance really fits
9:57
with how my brain works, how my body works, how my feelings and
10:02
emotion works. It's a very complex dance.
10:06
It's a very intriguing dance and it's an ongoing, forever
10:14
evolving dance, which to me, it just fits everything that I am.
10:19
I can never do the same thing for too long.
10:22
I don't like things that don't change.
10:25
I like things to improve, to get better or to find other pathways
10:32
and that is what Brazilian Zook is to me in my personal life.
10:38
It's a place where I feel like I'm always learning.
10:42
It's a place that I feel like is always challenging me to get out
10:47
of my comfort zone. And I'm always feeling like,
10:52
wow, this is never going to stop.
10:56
It's just never going to stop. That's why we, I guess we call
11:00
ourselves Zook nerds here, because we really nerdy about,
11:04
it's not just about the dance that makes us feel good, that
11:08
allows us to have a career. But to me it's very personal.
11:12
So that's the benefit for me in my life and the benefit that I
11:17
see in a lot of people's life, like Brazilian Zook allows them
11:23
to explore themselves beyond just the dance.
11:27
It's such a complex dance that has influences from so many
11:33
other styles and cultures that it really pushes you out of this
11:38
comfort zone. I'll compare Brazilian Zook to
11:42
modern or contemporary dance. It takes from a lot of other
11:46
styles, but it's not clearly defined in one way that this is
11:53
the only way and everything else is wrong.
11:56
And that's the history that we have seen with Brazilian Zook
11:59
from the very beginning. But then five years later, 10
12:02
years later, 15 years later, and now the dance is continuously
12:07
evolving and changing. But at the same time, I do
12:11
understand when we're looking objectively, there are a couple
12:15
of things that makes it Brazilian Zook, which are the
12:19
things that you mentioned. It's a partner dance, it's a
12:22
community gathering. It has certain distinct body
12:27
movements and shapes that like I mentioned in the previous
12:31
episode, even if you turn off the music and you watch a video,
12:36
you think I think this is Brazilian Zook or they might be
12:40
using movements or like shapes. That reminds me of Brazilian
12:47
Zook because it is so distinct. And I think what makes it very
12:52
distinct is the fact that it's such a mix of everything that
12:57
doesn't look like anything specific.
13:00
You know, you can look at 1 short clip of Zook and you
13:03
think, is that tango? And then you look at another
13:07
short clip of Zook, maybe 10 seconds and you think, oh, is
13:11
that contact improv? And then you look at another one
13:14
and you think, is that a hip hop dance or maybe West Coast swing?
13:20
Or maybe like from somebody who is not from Brazil, probably OK
13:26
watching around the world, they can connect Brazilian Zook to so
13:31
many dances that I think that's what makes this dance special.
13:36
Which to my last point here brings the pros and cons of
13:43
being so open and flexible that sometimes people can interpret
13:50
in a way that maybe goes too far.
13:53
Too far from what? Well, it depends on how you're
13:56
looking at it. Too far from Brazilian partner
13:59
dancing. Yes, we can kind of have a scale
14:02
of how close to or how far from, but the situation gets really
14:07
tough when you're talking about, you know, cultural values, when
14:11
you're talking about community values and things like that,
14:15
such as what's been happening recently.
14:18
Because in the end of the day, Brazil is such a multicultural
14:25
country. Like we've mentioned in previous
14:28
episodes, it can be very liberal and progressive in Brazil and
14:33
you can be very conservative that you'd think, Oh my God, is
14:37
this really South America at all?
14:40
Because that's what Brazil is. So I think Brazilian Zook in a
14:45
nutshell represents the complexity of Brazilian Zook
14:49
culture because it's so hard to even spot a Brazilian person on
14:54
the street because that's how mixed it is.
14:58
I got curious, I assume how would you tie Brazilian Zook
15:02
dance to Brazilian culture? How would you tie the shoe?
15:06
What would you say is the connection?
15:08
What is the element? I think the partner dancing
15:12
aspect to it, for example, when I look at my own family,
15:17
whenever we have a family gathering, somebody's going to
15:21
start playing some music, either samba or faja, and they're going
15:25
to start dancing together. It just happens.
15:28
Look, none of my other family members have ever done a dance
15:32
class. I'm the only one who has done
15:34
it. But my mom, my uncles, my
15:36
cousins, even my dad sometimes would dance a little fajal,
15:41
would dance a little samba. It doesn't look like anything
15:44
that we do in our Brazilian dance schools, but they dance.
15:48
So that, to me, is a really strong tie to the Brazilian
15:52
cultural aspect. It's a gathering of friends or
15:56
family members that at the sound of something that makes them
16:01
want to move, they either start moving by themselves or they
16:05
grab somebody, hold each other and move their feet and do
16:10
random turns. However, it works.
16:12
No technique, no dense class required.
16:15
So that is really something that connects to me, to the Brazilian
16:19
culture. Nice.
16:21
Yeah. I would say something very
16:23
similar to, I think, this aspect of social dancing as a friendly
16:28
gathering where you don't need to necessarily know the dance
16:34
with precision, no. And you can already dance Zook.
16:38
Brazilian Zook ended up acquiring a different reach, I
16:43
would say, and Brazilian Zook grew beyond the borders of the
16:48
country more than any other part of dance.
16:52
Perhaps Fajar has the same or a similar reach outside of Brazil,
16:57
but Fajar was able to keep its connection with the music
17:01
because the dance is dance to the music, and Brazilian Zook is
17:05
dance to so many different styles of music.
17:09
And because of that, because the different styles of music we
17:12
dance to that modifies the dance quite a lot.
17:16
Songs without a strong beat, songs without a strong rhythm,
17:20
they don't invite too much lower body movement or too much steps.
17:24
They invite more of the upper body movement.
17:28
And I think sometimes, and I don't know if you I agree with
17:32
that, Addison, but I think sometimes when people want to
17:35
preserve the dance, when they want to protect Brazilian Zook,
17:38
I think they also want to protect this aspect of rhythm
17:42
and beat, body movements, stepping, hip movements.
17:46
There was some time ago, some years ago, in which I remember
17:50
in Europe, the dances being to very lyrical songs and really
17:57
mostly upper body focus and really mostly had motion focus
18:01
too, where you wouldn't see what they're doing with their feet
18:07
because everything that was happening upstairs was so
18:10
mesmerizing and so beautiful that you wouldn't see.
18:13
And then I remember back then, but this is not the dance.
18:16
This is not Percy the Zoo. Call it something else.
18:19
Do you agree with this idea that preserving the dance and keep
18:23
being attached, connected to the roots is also related to the
18:26
songs that we play and the rhythm and the beats?
18:28
Because before I go to you, we have this very fascinating
18:33
things they say preserve the dance, keep the music, keeping
18:38
in mind that the music is not ours.
18:42
You know, like, play traditional music.
18:45
Traditional music is Zook is Zook music that we didn't make.
18:50
No Brazilian artist was part in making those songs.
18:55
How do you go about like, do you agree with that?
18:58
Absolutely. And I'm going to go further and
19:01
explain a few other things here about this Brazilian cultural
19:06
phenomenon across the globe, because the way I explain to
19:11
people what Brazilian Zook is, I usually start by saying, look,
19:16
it's lambada. OK, So if you've heard of
19:19
lambada, this is a Brazilian dance from the streets, from
19:24
basically the natural way that people listen to the music and
19:29
dance to the music. OK, so it wasn't a dance school
19:32
dance. Now Brazilian Zook was a dance
19:37
that was built on top of lambada by Brazilian dance teachers.
19:43
So it was a dance built for dancers and a dance that was
19:49
born within dancers that were trained and they had all the
19:55
things that dance teacher would have.
19:57
So it wasn't as natural evolving as lambada or as fajal or a
20:03
samba or salsa. Or so many dances that were what
20:08
I call like street born and raised dances.
20:12
This was a dance that was born and raised in dance schools or
20:18
in socials that were mostly attended by dancers who did
20:24
dance classes, right. So this is already very tricky
20:28
because for example, when I was in Australia, I taught Fajar, I
20:33
taught Somebody Got theatre and I taught other Brazilian styles
20:36
as well, my Brazilian Zook students and the Fajar and
20:40
somebody got theatre students. They were not the same people.
20:44
Some of them, some, a few would do both.
20:49
But the somebody got theatre and the Fajar students, they were
20:53
into their culture. They wanted to know what Brazil
20:57
is. They wanted to listen to the
20:59
music, they wanted to understand the lyrics.
21:01
They learned Portuguese. They traveled to Brazil not for
21:05
like congresses. They traveled to Brazil to
21:08
understand the culture. Just like people.
21:11
When they do capoeira, they come to me.
21:14
Like whenever people come to me around the world and they start
21:18
speaking Portuguese to me directly and I start talking to
21:21
them and I asked them, oh, how do you know Portuguese?
21:24
They're like, oh, I dance faja or oh, I do Capueta.
21:29
Now look at Brazilian zoo community.
21:32
How many people learn Brazilian Portuguese?
21:36
How many people learn Brazilian culture or even care about what
21:40
Brazil is as much as the faja, the samba, the Capueta people?
21:46
It's very different because like you mentioned, Brazilian Zook is
21:51
such an international dance, way more than the other Brazilian
21:58
dance styles, and that alone already makes things very
22:03
complex. Because how Brazilian is Zook in
22:10
comparison to all of the other Brazilian dance styles?
22:13
Or even in comparison to Lambada?
22:15
How Brazilian is it if it has West Coast wing influence,
22:20
ballet influence, contemporary influence, tango influence, so
22:25
many other influences? What is the percentage of what
22:29
we do in Brazilian Zook that is actually like very recognized
22:34
and very strong in other Brazilian dances?
22:37
Not a lot, to be fair. Not a lot.
22:41
We recognize it as Brazilian Zook because it's when you put
22:44
all of those things together, it becomes Brazilian Zook.
22:46
But when you think about it, yeah, it's very complex.
22:52
Yeah, man. Fairpoint Touché because when we
22:58
think about this aspect of music and the music being an important
23:05
driving force, right, we slowed down.
23:09
Things slowed down with Lambada a lot due to the dance slowed
23:14
down. Lambada slowed down, Zook slowed
23:17
down, Brazilian Zook slowed down because the music also slowed
23:22
down. So the music, the songs we are
23:26
dancing to, they are a powerful force.
23:28
They are a powerful drive. And when you go learn for horror
23:32
and samba, you dance to songs. They're all in Portuguese.
23:37
Of course. You have bossa Nova, you have
23:39
these songs with the samba rhythm.
23:41
They are not in Portuguese, they are not singing Portuguese.
23:46
But you end up listening to a lot of songs in Portuguese and
23:48
then eventually you get curious, what is it that they are saying?
23:51
I want to be able to sing along with you and everybody.
23:54
So the curiosity, I think it sparks almost like in the back
23:58
of the mind and it gets stronger, stronger, stronger
24:00
because day in, day out that you go out to dance, you are
24:04
listening to Portuguese. And especially with the Fajas
24:07
songs, they are so poetic. They are so specific in the ways
24:11
that they say certain things. So nice, so cute that I can see
24:15
people getting curious to understand what is being said.
24:18
Because Brazilian Zook, a lot of the remixes are songs in
24:23
English. Most of them are songs in
24:25
English. I feel very happy when I go to
24:27
Brazil because the DJs there, in my experience of social dancing
24:32
there, they play a lot of songs in Portuguese, lots of songs in
24:35
Portuguese. I have one of my favorite sets
24:38
is from a DJ in Brazil. Her name is Olaris and I think
24:42
80% of her set is songs in Portuguese.
24:45
I love that. And I feel this thing that I can
24:50
only identify as identification. I feel that I am where I'm
24:55
supposed to be. There is a deep sense of
24:57
belonging. And then just by changing the
25:00
language so it does have a powerful impact.
25:05
So I think I just some and building on what you said, how
25:10
Brazilian is Brazilian Zook, considering that we are Destiny
25:13
2 songs that were not made in Brazil, The name of the dance
25:18
itself has an element that is in French Creole Zook.
25:22
Originally we started calling Zook because we started dancing
25:25
to Zook music. And then you go on there, you
25:28
just put a lot of elements. What ties it back to our
25:31
culture, right? And I think it's even with all
25:36
these elements, it's still the result of the soul of a people
25:42
in the way that they like to move, in the way that they like
25:44
to connect, which is so inequivocally Brazilian in the
25:49
sense of the closest, the sense of the joy, in the sense of the
25:52
stepping. And again, I go back to the
25:54
lower body and we also do upper body amazingly well.
25:58
Of course, the origins of all of our dances, still they are lower
26:03
body. If you look at the origins of
26:05
Lombarda, they didn't have had movements and they were not, for
26:09
example, in Lombarda competitions back back in the
26:11
day, they're not supposed to open the embrace.
26:13
So stay in the embrace was super important.
26:17
Even though with all these elements that distance it from
26:23
purely Brazilian, you know, elements, I think it's still the
26:28
fruits. All the people who like to dance
26:32
in a particular way would like to move in a particular way.
26:36
And these immaterial elements, these metaphysical elements that
26:41
we cannot necessarily grasp or see very well, but we know it's
26:45
there, we know it exists. I think that's what many people
26:50
are trying to protect, that elements, you know, So when all
26:55
those years ago the dance was, there was this discussion about
26:59
this, the dance, this, not the dance because of the absence of
27:02
certain elements like the beats and the rhythm.
27:05
I think people are trying to say, but we don't do this.
27:10
We don't do like this. That's not the way we do things.
27:14
You know why you guys are so far away?
27:16
You know, why? Where are the hips?
27:18
I don't see the hips moving, you know, So there were a lot of
27:22
these elements going on. The other thing with what is
27:25
said, Addison, how Brazilian is Brazilian?
27:27
Zook is the element that we brought up before of how much
27:31
the dance traveled abroad. Then if you look and not going
27:36
to be hypocritical here, me and Addison are cases of that.
27:39
Addison is now living in Taiwan. I spend most of my time in the
27:43
US. This podcast is in English.
27:47
A lot of the content that we post is in English.
27:50
A Brazilian Zook went further from its border and expanded,
27:55
and in that expansion it borrowed elements of other
27:59
cultures, other peoples, and other ways of expressing.
28:03
I think, however, that we were still able to maintain this core
28:06
elements, and I think we can still be speaking in English.
28:11
We can still be doing events outside of Brazil.
28:14
We can still be expanding, expanding, expanding, while
28:17
keeping this core element protected in the sense of the
28:20
dance itself. When it comes to the environment
28:24
that we dance to dance, like Allison said, and like we
28:27
mentioned before, this element of a gathering of people that
28:31
get together to hang out and social dance, that's where I
28:37
think Zook diverged the most from other Brazilian partner
28:41
dances to the point that now it's so separate that I cannot
28:48
see Brazilian Zook dance and crowd inserted in a dunce de
28:54
salon, social or party. It's very hard for me to
28:58
visualize that the crowd is very different in the dunce de salon
29:03
party or social. You see a much wider age range
29:09
and then in Brazilian Zook gatherings you see the age range
29:13
is more limited. You know, you see younger people
29:17
in Brazilian Zook events, normally the socials are darker,
29:21
the parties are darker. In Brazilian Zook, they go into
29:24
very late. This thing, this thing, people.
29:29
Why are we starting the party at 11:00 PM and going until 5?
29:34
Also, when doesn't sell on parties.
29:39
I mean, from what I remember, what I see that it still exists,
29:43
at least in Rio. The social starts at 6-7.
29:47
By 11:10, we are over. Let's go home.
29:50
You know, healthy sleep, the music, the volume and all.
29:55
Like the more you travel, the more you see that people are now
30:00
using more and more these things to protect their ears, you know,
30:04
to protect their hearing, which for me is very interesting as
30:07
well. You know, why if the DJ is
30:10
watching everybody, like 80% of the people wearing the thing,
30:13
why don't we just like go down with the volume, you know?
30:17
So that's another story. So the environment that we dance
30:21
Brazilian Zook also is different from other Brazilian dances.
30:27
And I wonder, I don't know if we can break this down for us.
30:31
I listen, I wonder, where is the cultural element there?
30:38
You know, what is the cultural element of the environment of
30:42
Brazilian Zook when we compare it to other party dances?
30:46
I can't understand the idea of it being an open environment
30:50
that welcomes everyone of all ages, of all walks of life.
30:56
In practice, though, who's going to come out at 11:00 PM to go
31:01
out to social dance in a very loud room?
31:04
And when you are there and you observe, you don't see people
31:10
past a certain age, you know? So I think we want to protect
31:15
the safety of the environment. And that's super precious.
31:19
That's really precious. But I wonder what is this thing
31:23
when we talk about culture that we want to preserve in Brazilian
31:28
Zook, when referring now to the environment that we dance to
31:32
dance, it goes off course. Difficult question.
31:34
I, I don't know. I don't know if we can, you
31:37
know, bring this to us as an event organizer that has been
31:43
organizing festivals and things for so many years.
31:47
Yeah, that's a tough one because when I look at the community,
31:51
the festivals, the socials and the things that are happening in
31:56
the community, it's really hard to think that I could be taking
32:01
my parents or cousins that are either at my age or older than
32:06
me to just, you know, go and have fun just watching or maybe
32:11
even having a quick dance as they learn something.
32:16
Like, I would see something like that in a samba bar, in a for
32:20
hall party where I could take my family.
32:23
You know, we'll have a couple of beers.
32:25
We dance a little bit. We do a couple of steps here and
32:28
there because I do feel like it's more an inclusive
32:31
environment. But Brazilian Zook, even in
32:34
Brazil and especially outside of Brazil, yeah, it has become an
32:42
environment where the Zook addicted people gather.
32:47
It's not necessarily this place where people from all ages and
32:52
cultures feel like they can just walk in and have fun.
32:55
For example, I used to teach Brazilian Zook in this nightclub
33:01
in Perth, Australia, and it's a nightclub with multiple rooms.
33:05
So they had like a Brazilian live band room and they had
33:11
techno room, they had a salsa room, and they had our Brazilian
33:15
Zook room. And you'd see that people who
33:17
came to this huge nightclub slash bar, they would go to the
33:22
salsa room and just hang out and, you know, have fun, have a
33:26
drink, shake a little bit, a little shimmy.
33:29
They go to the Brazilian room, enjoy dance, you know, shake
33:33
their ass and do all the things. But then they will come to the
33:37
Brazilian Zook room and kind of like look and just go against
33:42
the wall and watch. Watch.
33:45
If they were courageous enough, they would start a conversation
33:47
with somebody and ask like, what are what are you guys doing
33:50
here? What dance is this?
33:53
But most of the times it was just like a little look, kind of
33:57
not really vibe with it and then walk away because it was kind of
34:01
like this atmosphere and environment of like if you know,
34:05
you know, if you don't, then you're just confused and you're
34:10
going to walk away and probably not even think about it again,
34:14
you know? So it's not that vibe that you
34:16
get in a four haul party or salsa party or samba party.
34:19
It is something that I think the community should reflect and
34:24
think about. How can we make it less that way
34:27
and more inviting for the general crowd?
34:31
Because let's be honest here, guys, we're always thinking and
34:36
looking for ways to grow the community, but have we stopped
34:40
to think the the community and the socials?
34:44
They're not as inclusive or open for the general crowd as the
34:49
other communities are. So that's something to think
34:52
about. Yeah, I agree so much with you.
34:55
I think if we are wanting to preserve Brazilian look culture
35:01
as part of Brazilian partner dance culture, we want to bring
35:05
it to more people. We want to make it more
35:07
accessible. The dance is already pretty
35:09
tricky and like I would say the dance can be very complicated.
35:14
But I think my humble opinion, Somebody got Fiera is more
35:21
complicated than with Oh yeah, as complicated and you see a
35:25
nine year old lady dancing. Yeah, when people say to me, Oh
35:29
my God, Brazilian Zook is so hard.
35:31
And I'm like, no, Brazilian Zook is a master's degree.
35:34
If you try somebody got theatre that's a PhD.
35:38
And it's like, and you see the old ladies, you know, doing
35:42
caterina, you know, like if you know what caterina is, is a step
35:46
where the follower takes the foot off the ground and does
35:50
these things here with the leg and sit on the leg of the leader
35:52
and then go back down again. So they do caterina, they do all
35:56
these things. You know, in tango I see these
35:58
older couples, they see the whole social all time with each
36:02
other and they are tricky dances because in tango, for example,
36:06
is months just walking. Who has the patience for that?
36:11
So I think in our desire to preserve Brazilian silk dance
36:16
environment, I think it would be really productive for us to look
36:22
at the environment that we have right now.
36:25
Like Allison was saying, people were in the other room.
36:27
This is also bachata by definition.
36:30
Songs are more uplifting. And then they go to the Zook
36:33
room and imagine it's a set from Lord Pfeiffer playing or owler,
36:40
that the songs are more, you know, that the set is made in a
36:44
way for you to dance a long time with a person and they have all
36:48
these walls and you, you know, so the person just left and then
36:54
go to, you know, and dancing, see people dancing.
36:57
It's darker, everybody's dancing and they go back to the other
37:02
room. There are people dancing in the
37:03
room and there are people standing up next to each
37:05
drinking something. You know, I went to a for horsal
37:08
show in Sao Paulo and it was just that people would stand at
37:12
a time, somebody invite them to dance, they put the drink, dance
37:15
one song, go back, drink back and TA TA TA.
37:18
Very different environment. So what is it, I ask, that we
37:23
want to preserve when we think about Brazilian Zook dance
37:27
environment culture? Because right now they are late
37:32
at night, they are very loud and they are very dark.
37:37
And the way that the sets are built are embracing all
37:41
different styles of music, which is amazing, which is perfect.
37:45
I love that variation. Woo Hoo, that's cool.
37:48
The thing is, if we think about openness, accessibility, safety,
37:55
are we going to bring our family to that environment?
37:59
You know, I imagine taking my mom to a social in a Congress
38:04
and my mom is in bed at 9:30, ten PM and she just turned 60.
38:09
She's not that old, you know, And I imagine taking her and
38:13
then take her to a loud environment where everything is
38:15
very dark. I would take my mom to a for her
38:19
party. You know, I would gladly do
38:22
that. Of course, let's be fair.
38:24
There are for all parties. They are also very late, you
38:27
know, that's there. But we also have the for all
38:30
parties that start very early, finish early.
38:33
So I think like Allison said, it would be nice for us to reflect
38:38
on this, would be nice for us to think about that and see if what
38:42
we are doing right now, it's really attuned to the culture of
38:47
historically what has been all the Brazilian partner dances in
38:51
what comes to the environment that it creates.
38:54
So the people who knows the dance can come and dance.
38:56
And so people who don't know the dance can also come and observe
39:01
and perhaps feel brave to stand up and do a little bit.
39:05
So I think we can leave you guys with this reflection until we
39:12
talk about this again. Yes, hopefully this conversation
39:17
was enlightening and eye opening and if you're looking for a
39:22
specific answer, I hope it's somewhere in the episode instead
39:26
of like at the end, we give you this concrete answer because
39:31
it's very complex. From the very beginning, we said
39:34
it, the dance is complex, the culture is complex, the
39:37
conversation and the disagreement is very complex.
39:41
But I think that the more we talk about it and the more we
39:46
listen to each other, the more we're going to grow and the
39:49
better the community is going to be.
39:52
So thank you for being here. Please make sure that if you
39:56
want to continue supporting us, go down the app and see if
40:01
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40:03
Share this with a friend. Maybe share this on social
40:05
media. And we'll see you on the next
40:09
episode for another yummy or tough topic.
40:14
We'll see. So thank you.
40:16
Thank you, everybody. Pages, pages.
40:19
Abrasus and Ciao. Everyone.