Let us talk handholds in social partner dancing, let us take a closer look at the basic handholds for the start position of Open Position in Cuban Salsa and for Salsa in general and for several other social dances like Bachata: “Claim the Wall” (The Cup) , The Pistol (Gun), the Spiderman, and he Classic Cuban Macho handholds. What are
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Syncopation is to use the timing in between the beats for stepping, and in its simple form, the “and” in the middle between the beats. Some advanced dancers might sub-divide the space between the beats even further. E.g.: Normally a Vacilala is done as a Three Step Traveling Right Turn on “1-2-3”. Using syncopation, the Follow could instead do a
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Coca-Cola is one of a handfuld of dance terms used or known by most of us. Why are left turns called Coca-Cola? Before we answer this question, let us take a closer look at the use of left turns in Casino, Cuban Salsa. They are surprisingly rare! I have analysed thousands of videos of social dancing, and in half of
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Rueda de Casino is great fun, good for socialising, a nice way to say hello to new comers as well as to old friends. But Rueda de Casino is also hard-wired choreography with no decision making, no leading and following, no improvisation, no creativity and no musicality. If we dance a lot of Rueda de Casino, the burden of the
Read moreTraveling Three Step Turns are the default way to turn in Cuban Salsa, making it easy to turn both in the first and in the last half of an 8-count, at least if the Follow doesn’t back-step but walks forward on “1-2-3” as well as on “5-6-7”. A Three Step Turn simply means to use three steps to walk a
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We have several good ways to start a social dance, and most of us agree that we should start with some form of closed position. One popular way is to use Son Básico or just to walk around more or less randomly in Closed Position or using the Son Box (Cajón), or to use the Adiós Closed Position Carousel. One
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How long or how short steps should we take in a dance like Cuban Salsa? Little is known about this subject, and it is seldom discussed despite the fact that it somehow seems to be an important discussion. The only thing I remember having ever heard from dance teachers in classes and workshops is the mantra that we should take
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There is some confusion among Salsa and Bachata dancers about Triple Steps and Cha-Cha-Cha. Are Triple Steps and Cha-Cha-Cha the same or what is the difference, and how, when and where to use Triple Steps? Cha-Cha-Cha means two different things. On one hand Cha-Cha-Cha is just a popular generic term, meaning any Triple Step in any social dance style, placed
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A dance can be likened to a pyramid in the sense that is should have a solid foundation on which to build. To me, the base of the dance, the baseline, is all important. To get the baseline of you dance right, tailored exactly to your talent, your abilities, priorities and age, and to constantly improve on and develop your
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The basic figure called Dile Que No (“Say No to Her”) is one of several crazy figure names in Casino. It is rare to find a dance teacher that can explain the origin of the name. Why is it called Dile Que No? If you happen to know the answer, it makes sense, but if you don’t, the name is
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