I am publishing this in “Men” community because this performance is all about traditional Georgian male dance.
I’ve been out of Tbilisi for less than half a month and am already feeling nostalgic.
Looking for Georgian dance clips on the internet, I came across this one from the “Romania Has Talent” show. It attracted me with the thumbnail — I love watching facial expressions of people who see the Georgian traditional dance for the first time in their life. The judges of this show truly delivered, and I was a little jealous of them experiencing it so genuinely and openly.
This performance was two years ago but of course the energy and the intensity of the dance is something that doesn’t change over time, only gets better with the dancers practicing more and more.
Georgian traditional dance is male-dominated and incredibly intense and expressive. If you watch the clip in its entirety you will see that the dancers’ movements are sharp and precise, and require athleticism of an Olympic gymnast, runner, and jumper wrapped all in one.
From what I learned about the Georgian dance while being in Tbilisi, this performance has three distinct parts, and you can feel it in the change of music as well.
It starts out with the Kazbegi regional dance, called Kazbeguri – very intense and fast, always performed in big black or white hats made of curly sheep wool called papanaki.
When the dancers take off the hats at 2:27, they move into Svanetian mountain regional dance tradition — Svan tseruli.
Finally, at about 3:49 they show the warrior dance with swords, shields, and sabers.
At 0:55 sec during the Kazbeguri portion, the dancer in the white hat who flies into the circle of other dancers demonstrates a unique technique specific for the Georgian dance — moving on backward-bent toes. I am glad they did a closeup of the moves on the show as many times it’s just not that visible unless you know what you are looking at.
It has become a recognizable staple of the Georgian folk dance. Apparently, it comes from the Georgian highlands and the entire Svan dance named “Tseruli” — the second sequence in the performance — is built around it.
It is an incredibly difficult technique as the entire body weight is put on the top (dorsal) surface of the foot rather than en pointe like they do it in ballet. To minimize the pain inevitable in this position, the dancers have to move fast and alternate the moves with jumps, spins, high kicks, and turns.
Another unique technique shown in this performance is dancing on the knees, which includes high-speed spins and high jumps dropping onto the knees. It is also very hard to do, and you will see the judges’ faces expressing both the shock and delight from watching it. The sequence starting at about 3:03 illustrates this particularly well in slow and stop motion.
Georgian folk dance is deeply rooted in the country’s history of invasions and warrior traditions. Georgian warriors had to fend off many attacks from various invaders throughout the country’s long history, and the sword and saber dances toward the end of the performance show their warrior skills translated into the language of dance as well.
I like to think of Georgian warrior dance as similar to Maori’s war haka, designed to show the warrior’s strength, determination, and power and to intimidate the enemy. It definitely gives the dancers a huge adrenaline rush, as you will see in the dancer’s facial expression at 4:59.
Even though this particular dance ensemble did not advance in the RHT competition because they couldn’t secure sponsorship to come back for the quarter-finals, I absolutely loved the judges’ reaction to the performance. I was also happy to see that the Georgian dance is getting more fame and recognition around the world because it definitely deserves it.
And to conclude with a small personal connection: On the Independence Day celebration in Telavi, I shared dinner of hinkali (Georgian meat dumplings) with this absolutely amazing Georgian dancer performing Kazbeguri dance in the clip below. He is the relative of the family that hosted me. I’m honored to know someone personally who is a professional Georgian dancer. Please give him a follow on Facebook, you won’t regret it.
Hvicha is an excellent example of a male leader who transfers his skills to the next generation as he leads his own dance ensemble “Kartveli” for kids ages 5-16.