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VANCOUVER SALSA CLASSES

What is Salsa Dancing?  A quick and dirty breakdown.

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What is Salsa? The name "Salsa" is the Spanish word for sauce.  Salsa dancing is just like salsa (the kind you eat with Nachos) in that its a mixture of many different flavours.  Salsa is usually a partner dance, although there are recognized solo steps and some forms are danced in groups of couples.  You see Salsa dancing has its roots in Cuban and African rhythms, influences from Puerto Rico, Colombia and New York.  But those are the historical influences, it is a dance the evolves in the same way that a language might.  Salsa today has evolved and within it you can see almost every other style of dance out there from hip hop to contemporary.  

So what is salsa? Think of english and how words become part of our vocabulary based on common usage.  Well salsa is the same thing, what makes up the music and the dance has a foundation, but it is manifest in different ways based on its usage. Just like 20 years ago phrases like “google it” and words like "megapixal" did not exist, but are used by everyone now so is salsa danced with influences from any other dance that the dancer might know.  Think about the differences of english in Scotland and America, the accents are completely different they both have words not found in the other, but yet both are english.  In the same way a breakdancer might interpret the basic step and the music of salsa in one way and it will look different than they way a ballet dancer or someone who only knows salsa might dance it.  Even though they will look different, they are both salsa. 
Well what is salsa? While the music is always known as salsa, the styles of dance that accompany that music go by different names.  The different names refer to the different styles of the dance.  There are basically 4 main styles of salsa that are danced around the world.  Learning how to salsa will depend on where you are learning it.  Here are the styles.
      • Salsa (LA Style) also known as dancing on1
      • Mambo (NY Style)  also known as dancing on2
      • Rueda de Casino (Cuban Style)
      • Colombian Style (sometimes called Cumbia)
But what is salsa?  Here is the thing Salsa is first and foremost a street dance, it was not developed in ballrooms or dance studios with equipment and dance floors, there were no special dance shoes.  It was a dance seen on side walks, in night clubs and at parties.  To learn how to salsa you first have to know what the scene is in your area, city or town.  Most areas have one prominent style (from the 4 above).  To learn how to salsa you need to ask people what type of salsa is danced.  Use the names above, any salsa dancers will know what that means.   The good news is Salsa is danced everywhere almost every major city in the world will have a salsa scene.  The majority of people who go, go just to dance so its totally normal/accepted to show up alone.  People usually change partners after every song so there is great diversity during a night.  If you are curious about learning how to salsa, check out our classes HERE.

An amazing musical explanation of Salsa music