Capoeira Mandinga Shanghai

Unfortunately we have to announce the cancellation of the Brazil trip we were planning to have for July of this year. Due to this international crisis we are starting to notice a very low number of enrolment of people in all kinds of capoeira event. The capoeirando in Ilheus which normaly holds around 500 people this year had only 60! Considering that many of the participants of our event would be coming from USA, Europe and Asia (which are the most financially affected areas) and based on the response we have had up until now we think that canceling it is the best to to at the moment.

I apologise for the people that were already commited and want to tell you that if you are still planning to go ahead with your trip plans I will help you to connect with other events that will be happening in Brazil around that time.

On the other hand I am seriousely studing the possibility doing a small encounter at the California Brazil Camp in Cazadero this year and am already announcing an event that will take place in Ubatuba Brazil next year the weekend after carnival of 2010. That will be a music, dance and capoeira master camp. More info. Will be posted here in time.

Thank you for your interest and support.

Mestre Marcelo

Did you hear something about “berimbau blues”? No?! Just watch.

Berimbau Blues live in PercPan 2007, Brazil

And what about electric berimbau…

or more cyber-punk things?

via capoeira forums

Capoeira Mandinga Shanghai 1st Batizado – September 2008

Watch more batizado videos!

We cordially invite you to attend the 7th Annual CDO International Capoeira Conference at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, April 1st-5th, 2009. Presented by Contra-Mestre Denis and Mestre Suassuna in association with the Cordão de Ouro Capoeira Club at UIUC. Great Mestres, Contra-mestres and Capoeira instructors will join us for a weekend of workshops, dance, music, and lots of fun.

We are very excited to confirm the presence of Mestre Suassuna in our event as well as the great masters and professors that will be attending our event. Last year over 100 students came from all over the country to take part of our Batizado and it was a success If you’ve been to our batizados before, we’d love to see you back, and if you haven’t, you can’t miss this opportunity.

Information on the Batizado along with registration forms are posted on the website.

Hope to see you there,
Contra-Mestre Denis

EBC Philippines batizado 2009

Escola Brasileira de Capoeira Philippines (EBC Philippines) will be having it’s 6th Batizado and Troca de Cordas on February 13, 2009.

Workshops will be on February 9 & 11 at 7:00PM to 10:00PM at the Xavier School Badminton Courts and on February 12 at the Rockwell Tent. We’ll be having Mestres from Brazil and Singapore and Professors, Instrutores and Formados from Brazil, France, Malaysia and Indonesia!!

We’ll also be having the 2009 EBC Campeonato de Ladainhas (EBC Idol) on February 10 at the Manila Polo Club.

We’ll be capping off the week with a whole day filled with even MORE workshops (Brazilian Jiu-jitsu, Brasilian Portuguese for beginners, Capoeira, Samba) free for those joining the Batizado and with the Filipino celebration of the CARNAVAL!! FREE to the public – also at the Rockwell Tent.

If anyone’s passing Manila, you’re more than welcome to join in the festivities!!

For more details you can message me at besouro@ebcphilippines.com

VALEU!!

official website: http://www.ebcphilippines.com/

posted by Besouro Branco

Pulling out the arame

Photo by Nicolas “Virtual” Usé

Mestre Marcelo Caverinha

In continuation with my last post, I will address some more aspects of stretching. This time I will talk about muscle isolation. I will apply this to both injury prevention and flexibility.

First, muscle isolation is a misnomer. I use this term to describe ways to stretch individual and groups of tendons, ligaments and muscles. Which one of these are you actually stretching at any one time? No one really knows. Still, I use this term for simplicity.

I will start with an example. Our camara Virtual talked to me about a sore muscle that had been bothering him for a while but he could not stretch it. Every time he tried to stretch, other muscle groups got in the way. These muscle groups would pull tight before he could pull the sore muscle tight. He asked me if I knew how he could stretch the muscle. I did not know. However, I did know how to stretch muscles close to it. I had him use a normal stretching technique that stretched muscles near his injury. By slightly adjusting the position of his body and relative positions of his torso and legs, he was able to pull the sore muscle tight and stretch it. In other words, he was able to isolate the sore muscle. This is what I mean by muscle isolation.

To be more specific, his injured muscle was on the outside of his hip, just above and in front of the ball and socket joint of his hip.

Read the rest of this entry »

“Beetle” tells the “true story” of Besouro, a Capoeira master living in 1920s Brazil. The film’s title comes from the name Besouro Manganga, which is a large and dark species of maybug.

According to legends surrounding the historical figure, Besouro was known to vanish whenever he was faced with an uneven fight. This grew into the myth that Besouro had supernatural powers and could dodge bullets and even turn himself into a beetle to scare his opponents.

More grounded details on Besouro suggest he was a rebellious migrant worker who frequently used his Capoeira skills to get into physical conflicts with landowners and police. He died in 1924 at the age of 27 after suffering stab wounds from a knife.

Ku Huan-chiu serves as action director. His credits include stunt doubling for Jet Li in “The Tai-Chi Master” and “Once upon a time in China and America”, as well as recent AD work on CJ7 and “THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR”, and also “Kill Bill”.

“Beetle”, a co-production between Buena Vista and Brazil’s Mixer and Globo Filmes is currently shooting.

For more details on Besouro Manganga visit Capoeira Sul Da Bahia San Francisco.

• “Besouro” official website (Portuguese)
• Official channel on YouTube

via kungfucinema and capoeira.com

Posted by Rastinha:
Hi there,
On behalf of Capoeira Mandinga Aotearoa I’m pleased to announce the 8th International Capoeira Encounter at Easter 2009, to be held at:

Mataatua Marae, Rotorua, New Zealand
Friday, April 10th – Monday, April 13th

4 days and nights of Capoeira – workshops, rodas, hot pools and the best food ever!

All welcome – this is our annual event and we welcome everyone involved or wanting to be involved in capoeira in NZ-Aotearoa, from all groups, all levels, all ages. We are pleased to be hosting:

Mestre Marcelo Caveirinha — http://www.mandinga.org/

Mestre Jogo de Dentro — http://www.sementedojogodeangola.org.br/

And of course our own Mestre Brabo

Price Details:

Prices include meals and accommodation at Mataatua Marae.

Earlybird (20% discount)
Members: $NZ320
Non-Members: $NZ360
$NZ200 deposit to be paid by 21/02/09

Snoozer (10% discount)
Members: $NZ360
Non-Members: $NZ400
$NZ225 deposit to be paid between 21/02/09 and 28/03/09

Late/Door (full price)
Members: $NZ400
Non-Members: $NZ450
To be paid in full after 28/03/09 and by 10/04/09

Balances to be paid by/at the event

New students extended Early Bird offer from 01/01/09 320.00 if paid in full within 4 weeks of starting classes (after early bird has expired). This applies only to new students who become members from the start of 2009.

Payments can start immediately.

Please email oi (dot) rastinha (at) gmail (dot) com for payment information or if you have any questions.

Please Note: Deposits are NON-REFUNDABLE and we apologise for any inconvenience.

NB: It is important to keep details of your deposit. We will be making a printout of all deposits for the Encounter. If a deposit doesn’t show up on the printout the burden of proof is with th

Joaninha’s blog is everything you can expect from a good Capoeira blog, with stories about her own training experience, tips, cultural aspects of Capoeira… But this Canadian camara has chosen a feminist and feminine approach to our practice. She tracks mysogynistic song lyrics in our rodas, she fights the upper body strength myth in female capoeirista’s minds and introduces talented and creative women who became mestres and contramestres. She was kind enough to answer our questions.

About her capoeira experience…

Joaninha — the ladybug, in Portuguese – has started to train in 2005 and got more and more involved in her practice with time. She trained up to 5 times / week, despite her father calling Capoeira a “Brazilian street cult” when she started classes !

About the Mandingueira blog…

Joaninha wanted to start a blog to practice her writing skills in preparation for a future career in journalism. Her modesty led to a great concept: she didn’t want to compete against great websites such as The Capoeira Blog so she gave a feminist twist to her own capoeira blog. And she doesn’t regret it thanks to all the exchange among her readers’ community.

About the Capoeira Mandinga Shanghai group…

“Embrace the exception, not the rule”, she advises through this Tom Robbins quote. Being a small group, it’s crucial for CMS to remain as open as possible to welcome all countries, styles and opinions.

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