Suraya Hilal

Suraya Hilal is a leading international dancer, teacher and choreographer. With years of creative work, research and teaching, she has created a contemporary form of dance which draws on the essence of Egypt’s older dances and honours their roots.

Working in an organic way, she has constructed unique concepts and movements which are inspired by and connected to older movements and dances of the Egyptian/Arab people and their culture. Drawing inspiration from her cultural heritage in Egypt and informed by global contemporary dance practice, her art embodies a modern living expression that at the same time resonates in the ancient.

Education

Suraya Hilal was born in Cairo, where as a child, dancing in family celebrations was a normal part of life. Dance continued to feature strongly in her student days as she studied Psychology and Special Education at university in the USA. She gave lectures, demonstrations and presentations on Egyptian dance while studying and researching contemporary dance and eastern forms, including Indian and Afro-American dance at the Catherine Dunham School. After graduating from university, she began to travel extensively in the Middle East and North Africa, studying and researching Egyptian and Middle Eastern dance.

Early Career

She settled in Oxford and later on in London in 1985 where, supported by the British Arts Council from 1983 to 1992, she developed her dance for the theatre. She went on to create and tour over fifteen theatre productions, working with top Arab musicians and composers, first as a solo artist and later with dancers in company work.

Suraya Hilal had received a Greater London Arts Dance Award in 1986, a Digital Equipment award in 1988 and a Dance Umbrella Time Out Award in 1989.

Television and Radio

Hilal’s work has been the subject of documentaries by Channel 4, ITV, the BBC and interviews on international television. One was a specially commissioned ten-minute piece made by director Terry Braun for BBC 2 The Late Show. It was a unique choreographic and narrative piece interpreting the song of “al Atlal” by the legendary singer Um Koulthum.

Hilal has given many radio interviews, in particular at BBC World Radio and Woman’s Hour Radio 4.

Touring

Suraya Hilal with the Suraya Hilal Dance Company has toured extensively throughout Britain and Europe at many well known theatres including Sadler’s Wells & Queen Elizabeth Hall London, Purcell Room London, Edinburgh Festival, The Place London, Tanzhaus Dusseldorf, Haus der Kulturen Berlin, Depot Stuttgart, Theater spektakel Zurich and Tans Hus Stockholm, Göteborg Festival, (IMA Institute du Monde Arabe), Paris, Copenhagen and many other major cities.

Over the years she received tremendous popular and critical acclaim. Her performances in Britain and abroad attracted full houses and often wildly enthusiastic audiences.

Major works

Her works include “Return of the Spirit”, “Celebrations”, “Jewels”, “Divine Rites”, “Colours of Cairo”, “Rhythms of Cairo”, “The Beloved”, “Spirit of the Heart” and many other productions.

In innovative programmes such as “Journey” she also collaborated with western artists. Her most recent works are “Al Janub” created and toured in 2001-03 and “Aseel” created and toured in 2004-06.

The new work " Oscillations" (El Mizan) has been premiered successfuly at the Rothebuhl Theatre Stuttgart in March 2008 and afterwards showcased at The Drum Auditorium in Birmingham and Kultur-Zentrum Theatre in Karlsruhe and continues to tour.

“Occasionally, history has seen artists bringing art forms back to life from the edge of oblivion. Suraya Hilal has done so for Egyptian Dance”

Guardian 1991

"A supremely gifted performer! Mesmerizing! Remarkable!"

The Guardian

“Hilal captivates the audience with a sublime sensuousness and purity of movement, giving visible expression to the timelessness of ancient tradition.”

Rheinische Post-G. Pölert “Al Janub” Feb 2002

"Suraya Hilal is a coreographer of subtlety and high skill and a dancer of quality" The Times

“[In Aseel] Suraya Hilal has gone back to the roots of Baladi ... but at the same time one also recognises elements of free dance and of contemporary modern dance in the movements, which almost always flow gently. It is thrilling that she not only never loses contact with the live music but lets her body breathe as one with the sounds of the accordion right to the smallest nuance, and dances the accents of the percussionists in pure understanding.”

Westdeutsche Zeitung 28.02.05, Klaus Schmidt

[Oscillations]...Hilal has the ability to cast hypnotic spell with the simplest of movements; a solitay gesture or an intense gaze..to watch er perform is to see music." (The Metro -2008 ) Keith Watson

"...Absolute poetry" Stuttgarter Nachrichten