Please join us on Monday evenings for Beginning Sundanese Dance Classes with Michael Ogi, Artistic Director of the Harsanari dance company. We will learn basic Sundanese dance movements from West Java, Indonesia and a simple jaipongan and pencak silat (martial arts) dance. For those of you who are not familiar with Sundanese dance, be prepared to be mesmerized as you view Michael and Harsanari’s 2014 Ethnic Dance Festival audition performance here: http://youtu.be/GAP9wiORLHc. These two wonderful performances got them into World Arts West’s “Panama-Pacific International Exposition Centennial Celebration concert in February 2015.
Mondays 7-9pm starting May 5th
I-Hotel Manilatown Center
868 Kearny Street (at Jackson Street)
San Francisco, CA
$10 per class
50% of proceeds donated to the Manilatown Heritage Foundation
Michael Ogi
Michael Ogi was born and raised in San Francisco. He trained as a chemical engineer at UC Berkeley and in real life is a computer systems analyst.
He first began studying the dance of West Java (Sunda) in 1995, and was appointed the director of Harsanari Indonesian Dance Company in 1997. In 2000 he first traveled to Bandung, West Java at the invitation of Irawati Durban, a renowned Sundanese dance teacher and choreographer, to begin a course of study under her direction. He makes regular trips to Bandung, and in his capacity as director of Harsanari has regularly brought teachers from Bandung to the Bay Area. His teachers have included renowned dancers and choreographers including Achmad Farmis, Diah Agustini, Nana Munajat, Wiwin Garniwi, Whandy Gusliandi, and Oos Koswara. His focus is on classical and jaipongan dance. He is known for his interpretation of the classical wayang dance, Gatot Kaca.
Mr. Ogi has also studied and performed Hawaiian hula as an olapa and alaka’i of both Mahealani Uchiyama and Patrick Makuakane, and Indian odissi as a disciple of Jyoti Rout, for whom he also taught a beginning class. He currently enjoys Mexican ballet folklórico and Peruvian dance.
Harsanari
Harsanari (Joy of Dance) is a San Francisco-based Indonesian dance company founded in 1997 to promote an American appreciation of the dance and culture of West Java through participation and performance. Under the leadership of Michael Ogi, Harsanari focuses on both the classical and folk dance forms of West Java, and also performs dances from Sumatra and Sulawesi. Harsanari is the only dance company in North America with this mission.
Harsanari performs regularly at public cultural and educational events throughout the San Francisco Bay Area, as well as events sponsored by the Indonesian community. Regular annual performances include the Oakland Chinatown festival, South San Francisco High School Spring Concert, and San Francisco Indonesia Day. Harsanari was part of Asia on Stage in 2011 and 2013 and has also given multiple full-length company performances. Harsanari was selected to participate in the San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival on several occasions, the first in 1998, and has just been selected to be part of the 2015 Pan Pacific Centennial concert at the Palace of Fine Arts. Harsanari has also been nominated for the Isadora Duncan Award in dance.
Since 2001, Harsanari has sponsored biannual workshops for the community given by teachers visiting from Bandung. Noted choreographer Achmad Farmis has also created several dances just for Harsanari.
For more information please visit http://www.harsanari.com or
Contact Michael Ogi at info@harsanari.com
manilatown.org 