Dance Tips

Warm Up
Leave a few minutes early for your dance lessons and give yourself some time to warm up your body before class if its cold outside. Dance injuries happen usually due to the muscles not being warm before using them. It happens more easily then you think! Wear a sweater or light jacket to start the class off and take it off after you have warmed up.

Should you buy dance shoes?
If you are thinking about buying dance shoes, there are a couple of things you might want to consider first. Are you sure you are going to be taking lessons on a regular basis? If you are just starting lessons you might want to wait and make sure you like dancing first and then go out and buy a pair.
If you are already dancing regularly at lessons and socials, you may want purchase some. Depending on what dances you are taking, will determine what type of shoes you should buy. For instance, if you are thinking of competing in Country and Western or you mostly go to social country dances, you may want to get "dance boots". One brand is called "Evening Star". If you want dance shoes that are good for any kind of couples dancing, you may want to consider "ballroom practice shoes". Be careful though, there is a good $20 dollar price difference between shops for the exact same shoes. You can't return or exchange any shoes after you have worn them. Some shops have no returns at all!

Social Dance Etiquette #1
Do not teach or criticize your social dance partners while you're out on the social dance floor. Remember, you are out there for fun and your partner is too. It is embarrassing for the person being told how to dance. It accomplishes nothing for anyone to go home at the end of an evening of dancing and feel bad about themselves and their dance technique. I don't criticize anyone about their dancing technique, even if they ask me to, on the social floor. Its inappropriate! Lighten up and have some fun! Let their teachers instruct them in group class or in a private lesson.

"Practice makes perfect"
Well, I don't know about perfect but it sure helps the memory out. Even going through what you learned in class for 5 minutes ago, when you get home makes a big difference in remembering for the following week's lesson or social. Several times I have heard "well we can't seem to find the time together to practice during the week with our busy schedules". My response is "practice yourself." It's amazing how going over pivot turns by yourself or thinking about where you prep to lead a turn really improves your own dancing. Then in class you can practice together. And secondly, attend some dances, if you don't already, that's where you can have fun socially with everyone from your group class plus get some floor time in. Who cares if you mess up, that's why everyone else is there too, for the practice!!

"Should I be warming up before my dance lesson?"
Yes of course you should stretch before any kind of dance class or social. Muscles can be cold and tight and injured easily if your not careful. Five minutes to stretch your body a little should do the trick for social dancing.
It is very easy to hurt shoulder joints for both the ladies and the gentlemen when leading turns and following them. Even knees and hip joints due to rotating incorrectly or the wrong kind of shoes that stick to the floor.
Be careful with your body, it only takes leaving a few minutes earlier for class to give yourself enough time to stretch and warm up.
Ideas for stretching include: rolling your head around to loosen up neck joints, rolling shoulders in a backward and forward rotation as well as pushing them down and back for a feeling of proper dance posture, moving arms up above your head and behind you, circling ankles in and outwards so you don't twist them, moving legs from the hip joint forward and back to loosen those joints up as well.

Footwork
Footwork is one of the cornerstones of good ballroom dancing - but it doesn't mean only learning the steps, it's also where your feet go and in what manner. One of the coolest things appearance-wise to learn, is to dance with one's feet together instead of apart. Your feet should actually lightly brush against one another as they move. This means you have to develop a good sense of balance, because - let's face it - it's always easier to balance standing and moving with your feet apart. GFV

Kicksteps
Kicksteps - whatever dance you're doing, try not to kick with your toes up. This is good if you're doing Country Western dancing, but for Ballroom, try to point your toes down and to the outside. It looks better.

Line dancing
"Line dancing" is a great way to work on body and foot technique. I still hear how many people can't stand line dancing and I think it is because they haven't tried it recently. No longer is it danced just to country music, line dancing is danced to every kind of music from swing to top 40 pop. Its fun and it teaches us coordination. This is how some dancers learn to syncopate for west coast swing or cha cha, its a chance to work on feet instead of lead and follow. Its great exercise and challenging to say the least. Line dancing has come a long way in the past 10 years or so. It may not be the greatest thing to sit and watch but it sure is fun to participate. Give it a try, work on foot positions, foot placements, arm styling, Cuban motion, etc. and you will find it improves your couples dancing as well.

Correct beat
Gentlemen: When starting a dance take your time finding the correct beat of music to begin on. Sometimes it helps to tap it out with your foot on the floor and start on the "1" count. It is usually the easiest beat to find in the music.

Break on 2,3
Make sure if you are dancing Cha Cha that you are breaking on the "2,3", it will feel better if you are dancing on the correct beat.

Ladies
Try to have patience and wait for the gentlemen to get the dance started, remember he is leading.

Grounding
The term "grounding" is used in dancing, but many dancers still have a hard time understanding this word. Basically if you can picture yourself walking across an ice rink, most people will try to walk across the ice so that they don't slip and fall. When dancing, you want to place your feet on the dance floor like you don't want to let them slip. Accomplishing this requires pressing your center into the ground over top your feet. Your feet must be placed in which ever position that is correct and no movement or adjustments after the placement. This grounding technique will make your footwork cleaner and your balance more solid.

Turning Tip
Try using the "cup and pin" technique for the connection of hands while spinning or turning. This is done by the leader making a pin with his third and fourth fingers (preferably) and connecting the pads of those fingers to the followers hand which is cupped slightly with the thumb tucked to her forefinger (out of the way of getting caught during the turns). It is important that the follower keep her palm and wrist facing away from her and to connect to the leaders hand gently. The leader can then easily rotate her because her fingers and palm (cup) will rotate with his fingers (pin) as she turns. In order for this to work, the follower has to have a soft tone in her arm, especially the shoulder and not push her hand above her head where she can't see it. If this happens, it is impossible for the leader to tell you how many spins he wants and makes it difficult to bring the followers hand down to stop the rotation. All of this is important for good lead and follow technique.

Proper dance technique
Lots of dancers say to me when taking lessons, both group and private, that they just want to be good social dancers and not competitors, so why do they have to learn proper dance technique. I reply with this explanation, "without using good dance technique you don't become a great social dancer". If your not using the correct foot positions, or the proper posture it causes balance problems and lead and follow problems as well. Usually when a move doesn't work, it is because of an incorrect body position or some other dance technique problem. I think that some people confuse technique with showmanship, that the competitors are trying to achieve. Learning proper technique makes you more enjoyable to dance with, whether you are a leader or a follower in couples' dance. Good technique makes a dancer look smoother and helps the general flow of the dance executed.

Ladies
While dancing West Coast Swing be careful not to coaster on your anchors, anchor in place and wait for the forward lead on the next pattern.

Gentlemen
While dancing West Coast Swing allow the ladies to finish their anchor before leading them into your next pattern.

Beginner Dancer's Tip
Try never to refuse a dance with someone who is asking you. It doesn't feel very good to be rejected. This tip is for the ladies and the gentlemen, and a reminder to the Intermediate/Advanced dancers as well. This is how we learn to be better dancers; by dancing with lots of different partners and dancers of all levels.

Ladies
Patience while learning moves in group class, the gentlemen have lots more to think about then the ladies, focus in on your following skills and most importantly the connection you are giving to your partner, rather then back leading the pattern for yourself.

Gentlemen
When taking a partner on the floor to dance, try warming her up by some nice easy basics first. Then gradually move up the level of patterns after determining whether your dance partner is ready to follow the more advanced moves. Remember your job is to make her look good and in return, you will look good as well.

Beginners
Make sure you have strong basics in any dance you are learning, before moving up a level or learning new patterns. It will make the next level a lot more frustrating if you don't know your basics well enough. We all started at the beginning and repeated the first level a few times before moving up. Sometimes as intermediate or advanced dancers, its a good idea to refresh our memories by taking a basic class again, as a reminder of a few things we have forgotten about.

Swing Posture
If you want to be cool dancing the Swing, posture and attitude are important and go hand-in-hand (no pun intended). Whereas one's back is arched slightly backward in closed-position ballroom dances such as the Fox Trot, savvy Swing dancers are actually bent forward a little bit. This - along with slightly flexed knees - allows for quicker movements which is important since Swing features several reversal of directions moves. (Courtesy Fox Tales newsletter)

Why We Dance

Man has danced since the beginning of time. Dance is an age-old necessity of the spirit. Today we put an order to it so we can manifest technique. This is due to survival of the art and we breed competition for the very dancers’ careers that succeed it. When it comes right down to it though, we find that dance soothes the soul and inspires the heart. We dance for the joy of it.



Movement is a quiet therapy without words; so much can be learned and gained through movement. Dance develops agility, discipline, focus, determination, courage, strength, grace, as well as honor, energy, spiritual depth, creativity, commitment…I could go on and on. The basic need to dance is what’s interesting; it is inborn in us. It is an outlet, a stage for human desire, a place for one to emote. Allegro cannot be executed without joy in the spirit, modern dance cannot be executed without emotional depth, jazz needs attitude and a sense of sensuality. All these styles developed out of raw human compulsion.

Modern dance is one style, that seems to dig the deepest. There are no restraints like pointe shoes, or severe techniqué. Modern dance is dance left in its purest form. We learn to fall and to rise, we learn to move with the wind in our soul – beauty and repulsion can exist in the same vein, at the same moment.

Modern dance is flexible, it can encompass anything from African tribal and contemporary ballet to natural reactions and childhood mimic. The rules are veiled and the order comes last. We don’t fight against the body, we flow with it. Thanks to Martha, Doris and Isadora, modern dance was validated.

Human existence today, seems so safe and unrevealing, how many outlets do we have to grow spiritually? They usually lie in the arts, and modern dance is the rawest form of life appreciation. Only when we learn to dance, can we learn to let go and live in the moment. We learn who we really are beyond just our tastes, preferences and relations alone. Instead of continuing to gain control of our image, reputation and financial success, we let it all go and we let our quiet being become elevated. Our spirit has more potential than most people are willing to recognize. When we dance, our spirits do too.

Various Styles of Dancing Salsa

Today, Salsa dancing can be divided into several styles defined by the geographic region from which they come. Generally, these styles are identified as L.A. style, New York style, Cuban and Miami style. Although these are not "official" styles, most salseros today identify the styles by these four names.

Linear Style
Refered to as dancing up and down a line rather than in circles (Circluar Style), the 2 major linear styles are L.A & New York. These styles are very closely linked. Both styles use the mambo step as a basic and are very slotted/linear in execution.

L.A. Style
L.A. style is very linear. It uses dips and arm styling. L.A. style is very flashy incorporating many flips and dips. L.A. style dancing is a pleasure to watch and a pleasure to dance and is usually danced on 1. The Los Angeles style uses the contemporary mambo basic as well but typically executes this step by breaking forward on count "1". The L.A. and New York styles consist of the same core components that make up their incredibly diverse repertoire of moves. The main difference is their approach to styling, the ebb and flow of movement. For example, if you were looking into a window at a group of dancers from both L.A. and New York and could not hear the music to determine the count you should still be able to ascertain the style of choice for each dancer. The New York dancers certainly have a more composed, elegant, and smoother look and feel for the dance. The women in particular tend to reveal a sensual quality to express the intricacies of this dance. Unlike the subtle nuances of the New York style dancers, the L.A. dancers would perhaps catch your attention first with their incredible display of explosive and technically challenging roster of moves. The execution tends to be crisp and sharp with a vivacious appeal. The L.A. men tend to really surpass the basic expectations of a good dancer with jumps, and flips, and splits, and spins, and get the picture?

New York / Mambo Style
New York style is more like Mambo. It makes use of body waves, free style footwork, shines, rib cage movements and shimmying.

New York has earned a reputation for dancing on "2" yet there are many New Yorker's who also dance on "1". There are two variations of the mambo step danced in New York, the contemporary mambo (a.k.a. Eddie Torres style) and the Palladium style. The Eddie Torres style is characterized by a continuous and smooth body rhythm and passing of the feet where the non-weight changing counts are on "4" and "8". The Palladium style is very much like the 1950's Mambo whereby the non-weight changing counts are on "1" and "5". Unlike the contemporary style, it can be very staccato (fragmented) in execution depending on the dancers interpretation and placement of the feet on counts "4" and "8". While this definition may seem trivial, it drastically changes the dynamics of how one dances salsa. The New York style tends to have the most varied interpretation/ opinion of the basic step than any other style. Although this is called New York style, the styles danced in New York dance clubs are fairly diverse.


Puerto Rican style
This can be danced on the "One" or the "Two" beat of the music, but it involves a tremendous amount of very technical footwork.There is more an emphasis on footwork, than in New York style, however, in recent years this can be argued by many a Mambo maniacs in Manhattan. In New York style, there is a strong Latin Hustle influence. The guess is that in the disco craze of the late 70’s and early 80’s, when Eddie Torres was one of the only instructors in New York, single-handedly holding the torch of "Mambo Dance" with Tito Puente, Salsa dancing almost completely grew extinct to the Hustle dance. Because of the great Hustle craze of that area, many Hustle dancers incorporated a lot of their moves into the Mambo style during that slow transitional period back to Salsa music in the late 80’s and early 90’s. Because Salsa is such a diverse dance, and there are no real "rules" of style, once you learn any style of dance, you tend to stick to that style when transitioning to Salsa.

The primary influence in Los Angeles is West Coast Swing and Latin Ballroom. Many of the showy tricks and Caberet moves are taken from Swing and Latin Ballroom, which is very prevalent and highly competitive and influential throughout the Mid and West Coasts. Unlike Miami, there are not many Cuban immigrants in Los Angeles, hence the Salsa dance style is predominantly a hybrid of Swing, Ballroom, and a soft Puerto Rican style. In New York, however, because of the high concentration of Puerto Rican immigrants, the Puerto Rican style is much like that of what is now New York style, Latin Hustle, or what we call "Mambo On-Two"
The fancy footwork (shines) is really starting to become very strong in New York because of this influence. It is almost an even match now, whether they do more shines in New York than Puerto Rico.

Miami Style
Although the Miami style has its roots in Cuba, it has evolved into a more refined and technically stronger variation of the Cuban style. It is also known as Classico Cubano style or Casino style. The basic step of Miami style salsa comes with a "tap" between measures. This "tap & step" is a characteristic of Miami style salsa and you'll know it when you see it. Miami style salsa makes use of "ganchos" or arm-hooks, which is when one elbow is hooked over the partners elbow to create a kind of arm lock giving the leader leverage to move his partner via the arm.

Dancers dance in a slot and do many flowing continuous circular turns. It also makes use of many pretzel- like holds, and as such, Miami style salsa becomes very intricate and complex-looking at its most advanced level.

On a social level, very little demand for technique is placed on the follower in terms of spins, footwork or dips. In a closed dance hold the basic mambo step is danced with an option to break on either "1" or "3" depending on the dancers preference.

Cuban Style
The music has determined the style of dancing. The contemporary faster rhythms of the more popular bands, such as Charanga Habanarra, and Los Van Van, are taking the style of Salsa to a more non-partner dance. If there is a tremendous amount of percussion, the woman can shine with her incredibly beautiful and rhythmic body movements. In fact, partner dancing the Cuban style is so restricting to the woman, that many of the women could not wait to dance solo for a while.

The way Cuban Salseros hold on to the women’s wrists during the majority of the dance, restricts her from extending her arm and fingers, and displaying a sexy style of her own. Cuban style appears to be a very male-dominated "macho" dance, more so than the New York or Los Angeles style, which fully displays the woman, and allows her to stylize with her arms, hips, and head.


"On-Two" dancing to hard-core Cuban music is also a bit more difficult, although it can be done with a very well-trained ear. In recent years, I found most New York dancers don’t particularly enjoy an entire evening of contemporary Cuban music. They prefer the traditional Salsa / Mambo music, that is more suited to their style of dancing.

The newer sounds of Cuban music emphasize the "One" beat of the rhythm and the "Three" beats of the rhythm, much more than the "Two" beat. The rhythms are also much faster, hence the solo styling done more often than partnering up. With the opening up of Cuba, and more and more Cuban music and bands visiting the United States, dancing on "Two" becoming tougher for the average dancer to want to learn, unless people still listen to Puerto Rican style music, and Salsa from Puerto Rico, New York, and Los Angeles. It will be interesting to see how the style of dancing in New York will change with more and more Cuban-style musicians entering the market.

Casino Style
This is a cuban circular style and turn patterns involve a lot more double hand holds. The complex but spectacular turn patterns resemble a game of ‘twister’ from which the leader will emerge, without allowing the viewer to see how he’s done the ‘Houdini’ act. It’s very clever, and it’s the role of the follower to ‘hang on’ keep rhythm and not allow the leader to ‘trick’ her. Cuban style salsa also has a lot of solo work which involves rhythmic middle body movements derived from the old Cuban rumba. These movements have an afro –Cuban heritage and are also popular in Mambo.
Although we have observed many different Cuban style dancers dancing on a variety of beats, it appears most comfortable within this style to break on the 3. When you listen to Cuban style salsa, son, songo or Timba (all related to Cuban salsa) it actually feels entirely natural to break on the 3. This has to do with the underlying clave rhythm which forms the basis of most styles of salsa music. The prominent bass encourages a lot of movement through the centre of the body and it’s more about rhythmic interpretation through the body than precision with the feet or strict discipline. It’s all about the feel of the music and therefore, there appears to be a fair amount of liberty there as long as you’re listening to the music. Frequent adjustments are made between partners to return footwork into sync, in order to do turn patterns.

Rueda
This is a Group Dance originating in Cuba. It is danced to lively, up-beat salsa music. The couples dance in a circle executing moves called out by a leader. There is a constant changing of partners, which makes it a vivid and joyful spectacle. There are three groups of participants in every Rueda. The caller, who calls out the names of the moves that are to be danced, (He may also use hand signals in a loud club setting together with the call.) The leaders, usually the men, initiate the execution of the moves. The followers, usually the ladies, perform the moves as guided by the leaders.

Colombian Salsa Styles:
Salsa is danced differently all throughout Colombia. In Cali, it is more "showy", in other, more rural parts of the country, it is danced more closely and tightly, with heads touching in some cases. However, the underlying commonality is that there is no forward and backward motions of the feet. It is simply what we call "Cumbia" style, which is feet alternating to the back or to the side. There are not too many fancy tricks, turns, or spins in Colombian style - except if you are a professional dancer, dancing with bands, or competing. There is record on film that professional Colombian dancers performing incredible lifts and swinging the girl around the guy's neck, etc., however this is not the norm. This is simply for show. Casual social dancing, Colombian style is much calmer, closer, where both dancer's bodies are almost completely touching each other, from head to toe.

Stylin'
No style is definitively better than the other. It's all really a matter of taste. They are all fun to watch and exciting to dance. Many salseros take the time to learn all the different styles and even incorporate their own personal inventions to create their own style. Salsa has no boundaries so many of the styles' combinations overlap, blurring the line between one style and another. The style taught at Dance Connection is predominantly, but not limited to, Miami/Casino style.

Who Owns Salsa?

Who owns Salsa, nationality, ethnicity and clave.
by Norman Urquía
London, Tuesday, 09 February 1999

One of the most hotly debated issues around Salsa is where its from and who owns it; in a recently reissued song, Pio Leyva sings, "if they talk to you about Salsa, lies, it’s called Son" (si te hablan de la salsa, mentira, se llama son). I can now reveal the answer is to this is … IT DEPENDS. It really depends on how you are looking at it. Are you tracing history of the rhythms back to their roots (how far back do you go, it could go on forever) or you could look for the people who developed it, or the people who consume it and keep the demand going. You could argue that Salsa is Caribbean because that’s where the rhythms came from, or maybe from New York because they jazzed up the Son and called it Salsa. Or you could argue that it belongs to all the people who dance and listen to Salsa from Japan, LA, London, San Juan to "el quinto pino", or the ends of the earth.





But often when people ask, "where does salsa comes from" they want an answer based on nationality, geography and ethnicity. What I’ve done here is to go through some literature on Salsa, which sheds some light on the question. The ideas fall under three main headings:

• Musical roots.
• Transplanted music.
• Trans-national music.

Musical roots.
Salsa draws on several Afro-Latin genres, among the most important influences is Cuban Son Montuno, from which salsa gets its rhythms (e.g. clave, and matriz "taka taka taka gun") and song structure (canto - montuno) which Son derived from Rumba. Salsa also drew indirectly on another Cuban musical family Danzon / Mambo. So Cuban music and musicians have been especially important to "Salsa". But there is furious debate around this, which I will look at by describing the contribution of the Cuban sources from which Salsa was created.

Son.
Son is an Afro Cuban music, which originated a century ago in Oriente, eastern Cuba, (Santiago is often quoted). Son drew on African and European musics but was predominantly played by and for Afro-Cubans and was considered vulgar by the elite. Son arrived in Havana (which was reputedly less racist) around 1909 and despite its association with the poor it began to attract following of white upper classes. This coincided with an increased interest and respect for Afro-Cubanismo inspired by authors like Fernando Ortiz. This respect was seen later with the "re-Africanisation" of Son by people like Arsenio Rodriguez in using the conga drum which had formerly been a rejected symbol of lower class black culture.
Son's two-part structure features verses, which set out a theme, followed by a call and response section of lyrical and musical improvisations on the theme. This structure allowed son to incorporate other genres, e.g. guajira-son, bolero-son etc and this gave Son a wide appeal in Cuba, which was also helped by it’s celebration of the everyday life of Cuba’s poor. Son became popular throughout Cuba around 1920 when Miguel Matamoros copyrighted the first Son, "Mama Son de la loma". International popularity followed in the 1930s when Don Azpiazu's orchestra performed Moises Simons’ Son "El Manisero" at the Chicago world fare. This gave rise to the US "rhumba craze" of the 1930s. So in 30 years Son went from being an obscure regional performance mainly produced by poor black musicians, to a national symbol of Cuba and "international pop phenomenon".

Rumba.
Rumba was Havana’s parallel to Oriente's Son. Traditional Rumba is an Afro Cuban genre, which emerged in the 1890s it featured percussion and voices and the best known variety (guaguanco) represents a sexual conquest. It was also associated with poor Afro Cubans and like other aspects of Afro Cuban culture was often suppressed. Afro Cubans faced prosecution for street performances of box drums and ñañigo Rumbas.
However the restriction of Afro Cuban and traditional forms didn’t extend to cabaret music, and the cabaret Rumba flourished during the US prohibition era when Cuba attracted US tourists. This was a greatly changed Rumba of lewd "sainetes" (short plays) which portrayed racial stereotypes to a racially segregated male audience. The music was not always Rumba but featured caricatured rumberas. Moore suggest that this parody especially belittled Afro Cuban music. References to black culture were in the lyrics not the music, through singing about poor areas in a mock black dialect.
During this period Rumba was suppressed while Son gradually became seen as the essence of Cuba, "Cubanisimo". So Moore sees the history of Rumba and Son as the struggle of Cubans to come to term with their cultural diversity and to create a national unity. The acceptance of Afro-Cuban performers as Soneros but not as Rumberos led to an increasing disguising of Rumba within Son as musicians adapted to middle class Cuban and international tastes.
The mixing of two genres can be seen in song lyrics, through the 1930s and 1950s, references to Guaguanco increased, Sones with little Afro Cuban percussion, referred to Rumba in lyrics. In the mid 1940s traditional Rumba was re-appropriated by black artists and came to be celebrated as a self-confident expression of black culture and Rumba rhythms began to appear within Son and Mambo; the Guaguanco in particular became seen as a source of authenticity.

Danzon & Mambo
Danzon emerged as a stylised derivative of the genteel contradanza (habanera) which was derived from the charanga or tumba francesa. This came to Cuba with refugees from the Haitian revolution. By 1920 the genre had become Danzon and featured flute, violins, piano, string bass, timbales and güiro. Danzon used a habanera bassline, a violin "guajeo" (the repeated phrase which is usually played on piano) and despite its more European sound Danzon was a Creole genre and often played for the white urban elite by black musicians.
In 1938 Orestes Lopez (Cachao’s brother) from Arcaño's band composed a danzon called "Mambo" which had a fast improvised section at the end. Arcaño added a conga to the ensemble, replaced the habanera bass with a Son bass and the played the timbales pattern on the cencerro (cow bell), so the new music now had feel of Son but was in three parts. Soon charanga ensembles adopted Danzon-Mambo, and when separate Mambos were recorded without the preceding Danzon section, a new genre was formed which was eventually to rival the international popularity of Son.

Transplanted music.
Since the 1930s Son had become popular throughout the Hispanic Caribbean, through live performances, radio, recordings and film. This popularity emerged from common cultural disposition created by similar histories of colonisation: slavery, sugar and tobacco economies and the influence of African and Iberian cultural forms.
So Son went from being a very local Cuban style to one which transcended cultural and geographical boundaries. A particularly important tie has been between Puerto Rican and Cuban genres. An often-quoted poem has the line: "Cuba and Puerto Rico are the two wings of the same bird" and throughout their history the two countries have had close links and similar histories. But because of Puerto Rico's geography, size and position it had a different experience of colonial rule, e.g. the ethnic mix was different because Cuba's indigenous population were wiped out, also Puerto Rico had proportionately fewer Africans and hence Cuba had a more robust and visible Afro-Latin culture. But both countries felt a need to distance themselves from the colonial influence of Spain and the emerging influence of the US. In Cuba black musical expression especially Son served this purpose, and Cuban genres also helped in Puerto Rico. They had been accepted there since early days e.g. contradanza, bolero and guaracha were adopted and became symbols of Puerto Rican nationalism.

Bomba and Plena
Puerto Rican national identity is especially important because many Puerto Ricans feel they have not had independence since the 1490s and they have often seen themselves in contrast with their colonisers. Music has been symbolically important in this, so Son and later Salsa were embraced as local genres, which confidently contrasted with Spanish and US music. Local Puerto Rican music like Bomba and Plena are important in Puerto Rico as folk genres and as influences in Salsa, but didn’t get the same mass popularity as Salsa perhaps because they were not established national musics. Mon Rivera, Rafael Cortijo, his wonderful singer Ismael Rivera, were the most recent popular champions of Bomba and Plena. But their music was really Cubanised, it used the conjunto ensemble, instrumentation and often featured a Son clave, Son bass and guajeo over local rhythms. Also the repertoire of the bands which emerged from the break up Cortijos combo, e.g. Cortijo's "Bonche", "El Gran Combo", and Ismael Rivera's "Cachimbos" all produced far more Salsa than Bomba or Plena. So basically the contribution of Puerto Rican people to salsa has been much greater than the influence of Puerto Rican music to Salsa. (Having said that where would Salsa be without Ismael Rivera, El Gran Combo, Cortijo, Mon Rivera, La Sonora Ponceña, Libre, Willie Colon, Willie Rosario, Gilberto Santa Rosa to name a few).
There is a counter argument that challenges the exclusive Cuban roots of Salsa. This suggests that Salsa is pan Latin and diverse incorporating many styles of which Son is only one. Some people suggest that Plena was as influential to Salsa as Son and that Salsa is very different from Afro Cuban music, in its instrumentation, tempo, arrangements and subject matter. It is hard to resolve these arguments, certainly Puerto Ricanisms in Salsa are more subtle than the Cubanisms but they are there. Sometimes a bomba pattern is played on a cencerro, or a song has a "lelolai" introduction or they are singing about rural jibaros, or Christmas aguinaldos. But before we even consider settling the Cuban - Puerto Rican debate there’s another argument which presents "Salsa" as neither Cuban nor Puerto Rican but North American; a product of New York where the Son became Salsa and gained a new significance.

Trans-national music
The USA has been important to the development of Salsa for several reasons. Firstly, along with Spain, the USA provided a symbol of colonialism to be reacted against, in the cultural world this lead to a greater acceptance of Afro-Latin musics, which might otherwise have remained marginal.
The US has been a major consumer of Latin music not only through tourism as was seen in cabaret Rumba, but also in the "rhumba craze" of the thirties (see above) followed by the popularity of the Mambo and Chachachá, which the USA helped to distribute. We often think of Latin music being exported to the USA, but Waxer argues that this was a two way process. The US influence in Cuban music is seen in the use of trumpets in Son and the Jazz influenced big band styles of Benny More among others. New Orleans was also closely linked culturally to the Caribbean in its past and in particular to Havana.
Perhaps the most important US influence on salsa has been as home to many Latin musicians, which led to new music, combining the New York experience with the original Caribbean sources. The Puerto Rican population of New York was particularly important to Salsa. In his obituary to Jerry Masucci, founder of Fania, Larry Harlow described Salsa's growth in NYC as a response to the reduced availability of Cuban music after the Cuban revolution, which led New York Latins to reproduce Cuban music for the new local setting. Waxer suggests that the transnational development of Son, Danzon, Mambo and Chachachá set the stage for the creation of a pan-Latin American cultural identity, and that this musical appropriation is linked into the development of a new social identity. Furthermore Manuel adds that in this process of creative appropriation and reformation that the original roots and ethnic associations can actually become irrelevant to the new identity being formed.

Conclusion?
There is no conclusion to this ongoing debate, Salsa is a trans-national genre, which draws on many other genres. What’s more interesting to me is not deciding who is right or wrong (which is impossible) but being aware of and respecting the many different contributions to the argument, and enjoying the many wonderful contributions to the music. I’ve touched on some of the issues. But I haven’t even had time to mention the relationship between Salsa and Calypso, Mento and Merengue or the contributions of Miami, mainland Latin America, e.g. Venezuela and Colombia or even African, European and Asian contributions which have all played a role in the creation of Salsa.
So a simple question like "where’s salsa from" leads us to questions like "what is nationality", "what is ethnicity" and "what is identity" and the idea of a music moving around the world and forming a joint pop culture. Its not a simple subject, you could do a PhD on it (as I am) and still not find a definitive answer. So now, when people ask me "where’s salsa from", I say "If you’ve got a couple of weeks, I can start to explain, but wouldn’t you rather dance instead?"

Jazzy Dance

The History

Jazz dance originated from the African American vernacular dance of the late 1800s to the mid-1900s. An early popular "jazz dancer" was vaudeville star Joe Frisco who, in the 1910s, danced in a loose-limbed style close to the ground while juggling his derby, hat and cigar.
Until the mid 1950s, the term "jazz dance" often referred to tap dance, because tap dancing (set to jazz music) was the main performance dance of the era. During the later jazz age, popular forms of jazz dance were the Cakewalk, Black Bottom, Charleston, Jitterbug, Boogie Woogie, Swing dancing and the related Lindy Hop.

After the 1950s, pioneers such as Katherine Dunham took the essence of Caribbean traditional dance and made it into a performing art. With the growing domination of other forms of entertainment music, jazz dance evolved on Broadway into the new, smooth style that is taught today and known as Modern Jazz, while tap dance branched off to follow its own, separate evolutionary path. The performance style of jazz dance was popularized to a large extent by Bob Fosse’s work, which is exemplified by Broadway shows such as Chicago, Cabaret, Damn Yankees, and The Pajama Game.

Today, jazz dance is present in many different forms and venues. Jazz dance is commonly taught in dance schools and performed by dance companies around the world. It continues to be an essential element of musical theater choreography, where it may be interwoven with other dance styles as appropriate for a particular show. Jazz dancing can be seen in music videos, in competitive dance, and on the television show, So You Think You Can Dance.

Ballroom Dance

Definition 'n History

The term "ballroom dancing" is derived from the word ball, which in turn originates from the Latin word ballare which means "to dance". In times past, ballroom dancing was "social dancing" for the privileged, leaving "folk dancing" for the lower classes. These boundaries have since become blurred, and it should be noted even in times long gone, many "ballroom" dances were really elevated folk dances.

The definition of ballroom dance also depends on the era. Balls have featured Minuet, Quadrille, Polonaise, Pas de Gras, Mazurka, and other popular dances of the day, which are considered to be historical dances.

Today, the term applies to any one of the several dances in which two individuals, a "leader" and a "follower," dance with physical contact through their upper or lower bodies, or simply their arms depending on the particular variety of dance. Since most social dancing is unchoreographed, this contact is necessary for the leader to communicate the next dance move to the follower, and for the follower to respond to this insinuation.

This stands in stark contrast with the style(s) of dance seen in clubs and other social gatherings where physical contact tends to be optional and the individuals in question can move freely without any such restraints imposed by firm physical contact or by the necessity to follow the rhythmic pattern present in the music.

Some knowledge of known step patterns is essential for both the leader as well as the follower for ballroom dancing. As most ballroom style dances require some knowledge and practice, they have lessened in popularity among the public in the recent decades. Dance historians usually mark the appearance of the twist in the early 1960s as the end of social partner dancing.

Royal Ballet School

http://www.royal-ballet-school.org.uk

MISSION AND PURPOSE

Their mission is to train and educate outstanding classical ballet dancers for The Royal Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet and other top international dance companies, and in doing so to set the standards in dance training, nationally and internationally.

The School offers an eight-year carefully structured dance course, aligned with an extensive academic programme, giving the students the best possible education to equip them for a career in the world of dance.

THEIR GOALS are to:

• Provide, in a caring environment, artistic and academic training of the highest possible calibre, offering all students of the School a positive learning experience which is constantly monitored for potential improvement.


• Achieve recognised accreditation for the vocational curriculum


• Offer students as many performing opportunities as possible


• Ensure that the students have close practical and artistic access to Royal Ballet companies


• Maintain a high employment rate of graduating dancers, with many being recruited to The Royal Ballet or Birmingham Royal Ballet


• Expand the international exposure of the students of the School by participating in international competitions and festivals


• Develop new state-of-the-art, purpose built facilities which will enhance the teaching and learning opportunities for the students.


• Conduct an extensive Audition and Outreach programme

SYSTEM OF TRAINING

The aim of The Royal Ballet School is to produce dancers possessing a strong, clean classical technique with great emphasis on artistry, musicality, purity of line, co-ordination and a quality of movement that is free of mannerisms. The intent is to produce graduates who are capable of integrating effortlessly into The Royal Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet and other top professional dance companies.To this end, a System of Training has been developed to encompass the eight years of full-time training offered at The Royal Ballet School. It draws upon the valuable traditions from different schools of classical ballet, retaining the best that was created by our predecessors while embracing the demands of classical dance technique as is required of professional artists today.At all times when utilising the System and training the dancer, emphasis must be placed on natural flow of movement, musicality, the joy of dance and the development of the dancer as an artist.

Salsa Steps

Origin of the salsa steps

The dance steps currently being danced to salsa music come from the son, but were influenced by many other Cuban dances such as Mambo, Cha cha cha, Guaracha, Changuí, Palo Monte, Rumba, Abakuá, Comparsa and some times even Mozambique. Solo salsa steps are called "Shines", a term taken from Tap dancing. It also integrates swing dances. Salsa can be a heavily improvised dance, taking any form the interpreter wishes. Modern Salsa has elements of Jazz, funk reggae, hip-hop and samba

Sexy Salsa

Sexy Salsa

The history of "Salsa" dance is peppered with hearsay and contradiction. Although few would disagree that the music and dance forms originate largely in Cuban Son, most agree that Salsa as we know it today is a North American interpretation of the older forms. New York's Latino community had a vibrant musical and dancing scene throughout the '50s but found limited success with the 'Anglo' mainstream. In the 1970s, adoption of the term "Salsa" reduced the linguistic and cultural barriers to mainstream adoption of Latin music and dance[2].

The modernization of the Mambo in the 1950s was influential in shaping what would become salsa. There is debate as to whether the dance we call Salsa today originated in Cuba or Puerto Rico. Cuba's influence in North America was diminished after Castro's revolution and the ensuing trade embargo. New York's Latino community was largely Puerto-Rican. Salsa is one of the main dances in both Cuba and Puerto Rico and is known world-wide.

Tango at The Beginning

History of Tango

The dance originated in lower-class districts of Buenos Aires. The music derived from the fusion of various forms of music from Europe.[1] Jorge Luis Borges in "El idioma de los argentinos" writes:"Tango belongs to the Rio de la Plata and it is the son of Uruguayan "milonga" and grandson of the "habanera". The word Tango seems to have first been used in connection with the dance in the 1890s. Initially it was just one of the many dances, but it soon became popular throughout society, as theatres and street barrel organs spread it from the suburbs to the working-class slums, which were packed with hundreds of thousands of European immigrants.

In the early years of the twentieth century, dancers and orchestras from Buenos Aires and Montevideo travelled to Europe, and the first European tango craze took place in Paris, soon followed by London, Berlin, and other capitals. Towards the end of 1913 it hit New York in the USA, and Finland. In the USA around 1911 the name "Tango" was often applied to dances in a 2/4 or 4/4 rhythm such as the one-step. The term was fashionable and did not indicate that tango steps would be used in the dance, although they might be. Tango music was sometimes played, but at a rather fast tempo. Instructors of the period would sometimes refer to this as a "North American Tango", versus the "Rio de la Plata Tango". By 1914 more authentic tango stylings were soon developed, along with some variations like Albert Newman's "Minuet" Tango.

In Argentina, the onset in 1929 of the Great Depression, and restrictions introduced after the overthrow of the Hipólito Yrigoyen government in 1930 caused Tango to decline. Its fortunes were reversed as tango again became widely fashionable and a matter of national pride under the government of Juan Perón.

Tango declined again in the 1950s with economic depression and as the military dictatorships banned public gatherings, followed by the popularity of Rock and Roll. The dance lived on in smaller venues until its revival in 1983 following the opening in Paris of the show Tango Argentino created by Claudio Segovia & Hector Orezzoli. This show made a revolution worldwide, and people everywhere started taking tango lessons.

In 1990, dancers Miguel Angel Zotto and Milena Plebs founded the "Tango X 2" Company , generating novel spectacles and that a great current of young people incline for the dance of the tango, an unusual thing at the time. They created a style that recovered the traditional tango of the milongas, renewed it and placed it as central element in its creations, doing an archeological search of the diverse styles of the tango.
Many shows toured around the world, such as Broadway Musicals Tango Argentino & Forever Tango, Tango X 2, and Tango Pasion among others.

Dynamic Tango Dance

Tango is.....

Tango is a musical genre and its associated dance forms that originated in Buenos Aires, Argentina and Montevideo, Uruguay and spread to the rest of the world soon after that.

Early tango was known as tango criollo, or simply tango. Today, there are many tango dance styles, including Argentine Tango, Uruguayan Tango, Ballroom tango (American and International styles), Finnish tango and vintage tangos. What many consider to be the authentic tango is that closest to that originally danced in Argentina and Uruguay, though other types of tango have developed into mature dances in their own right.

About Classical Ballet

So Classic.........

Classical ballet is the most formal of the ballet styles; it adheres to traditional ballet technique. There are variations relating to area of origin, such as Russian ballet, French ballet, and Italian ballet.

The five most well-known styles of ballet are:

• the Vaganova method, or Russian Method, after Agrippina Vaganova,
• the Cecchetti method, or Italian Method, after Enrico Cecchetti,
• the Bournonville Method, or Danish Method, after August Bournonville,
• the Balanchine Method, or ABT Method, after George Balanchine,
• and the Royal Academy of Dance Method, or R.A.D. Method, created in England.
  

Let's Start w/ Ballet

.... Ballet ....

Wikipedia.org says that

"Ballet is a formalized form of dance with its origins in the Italian Renaissance court, further developed in France and Russia as a concert dance form. It is a highly technical form of dance with its own vocabulary. It has been influential as a form of dance globally and is taught in ballet schools around the world which use their own culture and society to modernize the art.

Ballet dance works (ballets) are choreographed, and also include mime, acting, and are set to music (usually orchestral but occasionally vocal). It is best known in the form of classical ballet, notable for its techniques, such as pointe work and turn-out of the legs, its graceful, flowing, precise movements, and its ethereal qualities. Later developments include neoclassical ballet and contemporary ballet."

Do you think it's sound hard to learn? I think so...But, don't you see that someone who can dance ballet have a good body appearance.They always walk or stand with sturdy body.

I really love it :)

Hi guys!

It's really interesting if we know how to make our day happier and colorfull, right? Like me. I really love to dance. Although i'm not a professional dancer, i like to spent my spare time to dance.


Lets check.. Ballet, salsa, tango, modern dance, and more and more.. So many name of dance. (Which is sound of pity that i never get chance to learn salsa and tango..)

What about you? Do you like dancing same as me? If so, let's begin to surf here.

Enjoy!