Mestre Joaozinho da Figueira is a legend in his own right, not least for his weekly Friday night roda in West London (he hasn’t missed one for 6 years!) Testament to his good energy, fame and connectivity is the list of high-profile guests he has had in his roda. On this Friday night before Christmas 2012, there were two very special guests. This is one of my favourite capoeira clips because of Joaozinho (bermibau, singing) and the friendship, energy and top level capoeira from these two famous capoeiristas.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=APXVvO0ut8E

The end of the roda…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8Q4BidhEjg

JingaFest Summer Camp 2012 is the UK’s premium capoeira retreat held in Cornwall over the Queen’s Diamond Jubillee double bank holiday weekend: Friday June 1^st – Tuesday June 5^th.

We have:

• 9 guest teachers confirmed so far
• over 30 workshops across 4 days
• lots of cool eco-friendly facilities
• online ticket sales – ON SALE NOW
• extra info about the venue, travel and what to bring (please let me know if i’ve forgotten anything)

If you are open-minded and share our capoeira philosophy, then come and join us for a capoeira holiday with lots more besides.

Mark yourself ‘busy’ for the Queen’s Jubillee weekend and sneak off for a big of R & R. See you there.

To navigate the JingaFest pages, follow the drop-down menu above, or the links below.

Tudo de bom, alegira saude e paz

Canguru

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Extra Info

JingaFest (Summer Camp) 2012 is the UK’s premium capoeira retreat held in Cornwall over the Queen’s Diamond Jubillee double bank holiday weekend: Friday June 1st – Tuesday June 5th.

The 4-day festival will feature over 30 capoeira workshops across all styles from renowned UK masters (including Mestre Joaozinho & CM Claudio Campos) and other guest teachers, as well as workshops in yoga & samba.

The venue is the Chyan Cultural Centre (near Falmouth), an 11 acre nature reserve, woodland and organic garden, complete with its very own stream. There are two modern barns (with high-quality wooden floors) and several tented structures, such as tepees, marquees and yurts, which will house a shop, message therapy centre and tea/coffee room. The site also has natural toilets, wood-fired showers and hot tub.

We anticipate no more than 100 adults on site, plus some children. Tickets are sold in advance so that we can cater as well as possible for everyone. All you will need to bring is a tent, a toothbrush and a chilled attitude.

More info will be uploaded here soon. In the meantime, when people ask you what you’re doing on the Queen’s Jubillee weekend, tell them you’re going to JingaFest Summer Camp.

Tudo de bom – saude e paz Canguru

Now that Jennifer Lopez has been pictured (and filmed) on a beach in Montevideo, Uruguay, practicing capoeira, will capoeira teachers receive the same response from people eager to emulate the super-famous singer/actor? Somehow I doubt it, but I would love to be proved wrong.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvV7iXQGx4k

Of course this publicity (already featured in Hello! Magazine online) will raise the profile of our beloved (but very niche) art form. But when Madonna and Geri Halliwell publicised their hobbies, they were already, I think, experienced yoga students and were happy to shout about the benefits of their new hobby. In this case it seems that J-Lo was practicing the basics learnt in her first class (and doing an excellent job too, esp for a ’42-yr-old with twins’). So I doubt we will see people flocking to our classes.

Furthermore, the quality of capoeira practiced by the muscle-bound, topless chaps in this video (which has thankfully now been removed) is an ugly crime against all that is beautiful in our graceful & fluid art form. If a capoeira game is an interactive conversation, the teacher in this video was just shouting at himself (and poor J-Lo) as he displayed his muscle-bound physique -- the sort you only get from working out in a gym, not from playing capoeira!

But, as I step down from my soap box, I extend warm thanks to J-Lo for this publicity (and to her lawyers for removing the video) She’s representing all the 40-plus yummy mummies and raising awareness for a past-time which I hold very dear to me heart.

Valeu J-Lo, Canguru

It’s a funny way to get to know someone, capoeira!

Instead of having a beer or going ‘out’, you throw kicks and trips at each other to see what they throw back at you. You ask a question and they answer. The content of the answer and the conversation which follows tells you a lot about them -- as well as yourself. Out of this exchange, some of the longest-lasting friendships (amizades) are borne.

This weekend I went to the Winter capoeira festival of Claudio Campos in Bristol (see pic above) and made (and renewed) solid connections with a huge number of very special people purely through capoeira. I wouldn’t remember most of their names (sounds bad) if it wasn’t for Facebook but I do remember the ‘conversations’ and the good vibes expressed through the capoeira games.

I also remember the reconnection I made with with my own capoeira (and personal) character following a period of hard times. The power of capoeira as a therapy never ceases to amaze me.

Here is a short video of the batizado (grading) from the event. You can see me strut my stuff at 4mins50secs:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=287Om2K9z6E

I used to practice (and teach) this style of capoeira (contemporary) for 8 years. Two years ago I started to learn Angola….

To read the next instalment of this blog, sign up to my RSS feeds or follow me on facebook.

Tudo de bom, Canguru

Thanks to students from Pao de Milho’s group (Angoleiros do Mar Devon), from Claudio’s group in bristol, the massive contingent from Aloprado’s ACER CapoeiraMundo group in London and to my students from Cornwall (who helped to organise and run the festival), plus guest teachers Bom Jesus, Ligado, Vermelho & Ninjinho, this event just got better!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=UN7SyIQH6LM

JingaFest Inverno 2011 was the 4th Jingafest in Cornwall. Our 4 guest instructors have been Paulinha (Amazonas London), M Fantasma (East London Capoeira), Laurie (Filhos de Angola London) and now Claudio Campos (Nucleo de Capoeiragem, Bristol).

These guests keep getting better and better, raising the bar  each time, with each one bringing even more energia boa & alegria to our growing festival.

As soon as Claudio started talking to the 30-plus capoeiristas at the first workshop, asking them all about their history and experience before he started the class, I knew that this was going to be an amazing event. His positive energy, openness and massive smiles set the tone for the weekend. You’ll see in the video below at 1min15secs, as Claudio runs out of the roda and the studio, returning with a massive, micheivous, teethy smile and a hug for Ninjinho. This sums up the whole weekend for me. Claudio was happy to be in our roda and we were most thankful that he chose to come to Cornwall and spread his open philosphy to the Jingafesters!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tvi_U6vewWc

His teaching style was refreshing, giving us all some great ideas to work with, myself included, but it was the attitude with which he delivered the sessions and the way he conducted himself that was so refreshing in our capoeira world, which is filled with so much ego and insecurities.

The next JingaFest will be a camping festival event in June 2012 in an eco-community field in Cornwall -- capoeira, yoga, samba, campfires, food and lots of energia boa! Sign up to your RSS feeds and watch this space for more info about JingaCamp 2012.

Muito obrigado, Canguru

Here’s some more games form the weekend:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xyzcbpyl57E

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ptgsIjX77k

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEHlkgADJIs

Mark yourself ‘free’ for the 4th Jingafest in Penryn, Cornwall - November 18-20, 2011

Special guests: Claudio Campos (Bristol), Pao de Milho (Devon), Aloprado, Ninjinho (London), Bom Jesus, Ligado, Maezinha (Cornwall).

Venue: St Gluvias Hall, off of West St, Penryn (directions below)

Timetable:

Friday night (6-10pm): capoeira music and movement workshop (Canguru)/welcome roda

Saturday (11am-9pm):

11-1pm – capoeira workshop with Claudio Campos

1-2:30pm – lunch break for capoeiristas while we host the showcase finale of our Brincadeira samba project with 50 local primary school children.

2:30-7pm - capoeira workshop & rodas with Claudio Campos

7-9pm – Brazilian meal

9-12pm – there’s no real plan here, but half of the Jingafest party are staying at Jacob’s Ladder, Falmouth, where there is a live ska/reggae band, entry is free!

Sunday 11am-4pm): capoeira workshop & rodas with Claudio Campos

 Prices:

£30 (paid in advance) for whole weekend (4 capoeira workshops, t-shirt, meal and lots of good vibes…), or £35 paid on the day.

If you can’t attend the whole weekend, don’t worry, you can pay for workshops, meal and t-shirt individually or watch the rodas for free, please contact Canguru for details or just trun up.

Directions to St Gluvias hall

Our venue is the same hall which we used for JingaFest in June (Saturday) this year. The hall is set back from the main road (West St) so you won’t see it from car/bus. If traveling by car you’ll need to park in one of the free car parks which are located to the left and right of the clock tower. This google map will take you to West St/Shute Lane. From here walk with the traffic about 50yrds until you see a small gate on your left opposite no. 49 West St, go through the gate and you can’t miss it. There should be signs for ‘Brincadeira’ & ‘Jingafest’. If you find Stuart Stephen Memorial Hall on West St, you’re very close, just go back up the street until you see the small gate on your right.

Jinga Communities director Craig Blackburn attended the CRCC Awards ceremony in Newquay last week as a guest speaker to talk about his experiences as a beneficiary of Convergence Funding and his work with CRCC (Cornwall Rural Community Council).

Following the presentation to over 50 social entrpreneurs, he was awarded with the top prize in the awards cerememony in the category of ’Making the most difference’.

Jinga Communities has received almost £14,000 over the past 18 months as part of the Community Grants and Skills for Work programs.

‘Of course I am overjoyed,’ said Craig. ‘I was invited here to talk about my work and hopefully inspire other similar organisations. I didn’t expect to win an award…and certainly not the top prize!’

The money will go towards training and development of the company and its growing number of volunteers.

Craig is pictured with Peter Jefferson, chief executive of CRCC. For more info on CRCC, click here

The Brincadeira Project will deliver the samba clubs in 12 primary schools in disadvantaged areas between now and March 2012.

Half of the schools will run a club in the carnival dance Samba Reggae; the other half will make a 15-piece samba band. The dancers and drummers will then join together to create a finale showcase event.

Brincadeira is funded by the National Lottery’s Awards for All program and run by Falmouth-based Jinga Communities, training provider the Brazilian art form capoeira. The company received the £10,000 funding for the project in July 2011.

Director Craig Blackburn said: ‘We’re really happy to be working with Lottery funder once again and even luckier to have the chance to work Sarah Hyams and Robin Tynedale, our teachers for this project. Their knowledge of Brazilian percussion and dance is truly phenomenal.

‘I’m also really happy to deliver a project using samba as it compliments our core offering of capoeira training. Just like capoeira, these art forms are fully-inclusive; they offer so many benefits for the children such as improvements in confidence and communication skills, increased cultural awareness and wellbeing. And it’s loads of fun!’

The children in the project will also make masks, costumes and instruments from recycled materials to show off at the Carnival show. Other children will be able to get involved in the project through a Brazil Carnival Art competition and a volunteer program for 11-16year-olds.

The first half of the project is now under way, delivering samba band clubs at Trannack, Mylor Bridge and St Martin-in-Meneage primary schools and samba dance sessions at Falmouth Primary, St Francis CofE and Penryn Juniors. The sessions started this week (September 19-22^nd)  The showcase event will be on Saturday, November 19.

In January 2012, Project Brincadeira will repeat the whole process in another six schools, with a finale event on March 17, 2012. The primary schools in the next phase of the project will be: King Charles, Boskenwyn, St Keverne, Cury CofE, Halwin and St Mary’s Catholic primary schools.

Proudly sponsored by Awards for All

Jinga received £1,600 this month (July) thanks to 16 of its stakeholders and support from the Cornwall Rural Community Council (CRCC).

Most of the money will pay for sales training and business consultancy to take it to the next level, allowing the 3-year-old Cornish company deliver more free training in the Afro-Brazilian art forms of capoeira and samba to young people throughout the county.

The rest of the money has been used to ‘put Cornwall on the global map’ following a visit to Sweden, where founding director Craig Blackburn gave a seminar 100 people from 6 countries on how capoeira and samba was being used to improve the lives of young people in Cornwall.

‘Who’d have thought that Cornwall would be a leader in social change through Afro-Brazilian music and dance,’ said Mr Blackburn. ‘It seems that this is a very new area of work globally and there is not much research out there. People are calling me a pioneer, yet I live in one of the least culturally diverse parts of the UK.

‘Since my seminar and the publication of an article and video online I have been inundated with responses from people in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Brazil, Jamaica, Latvia, Norway and Finland who are searching for help in this same field.

‘Thanks to CRCC and the 16 students, parents and teachers who supported us, this funding has allowed us to take Jinga to the next level and put Cornwall on the global map in this field,’ he said.

CRCC, a local charitable company working for communities and the voluntary sector in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly, helped Jinga to access the training grant by supporting 16 learners to achieve an adult qualification in literacy or numeracy, in conjunction with AWC Training.

To see the article and video please click here

Read this story on the CRCC website

Note to Editors

• CRCC is a local charitable company working for communities and the voluntary sector in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly.  A long-established local charity providing friendly, personal advice and on-going support to groups and individuals, both from their offices and through face-to-face visits. In this way, assisting communities and volunteers to realise their potential and improve local conditions. CRCC’s mission is to enable Cornish communities to be vibrant, sustainable and inclusive.
• Craig Blackburn was invited to talk about social enterprise and capoeira in Sweden by Eurico Vianna Neto, a Brazilian Phd Social Science student living in Australia, and a capoeira master. Craig’s article and video (made by Eurico as part of his studies) was published on Eurico’s blog.