During the YA Salsa Social on Oct. 30, Marc B. and Sarah Zuccaro showed us a style of dance that is gaining popularity in North America, called Zouk. Here are some details on Zouk, and another dance gaining popularity, known as Kizomba, with a few videos for your reference.

Zouk

Brazilian Zouk (Zouk-Lambada) is a group of closely related dance styles related to the lambada dance style and is typically danced to zouk music or other music containing the zouk beat.

The name Brazilian Zouk is used to distinguish the dance from the Caribbean Zouk dance style, which is historically related to, but very different from, Lambada.

Unlike Salsa, Zouk is often lead by parts of the body other than hands, mos often the hips. Aside from Zouk music, Brazilian Zouk is also often danced to R&B, Soul, Latin Pop, and Arabic music mixed with a zouk beat.

Zouk is alse very popular in places like Brazil, Australia, the Netherlands, and Europe and is often on the menu of workshops and performances offered at bachata congresses.

Videos

Zouk

Neo-Zouk

Kizomba

Kizomba is one of the most popular genres of dance and music created in Angola. Derived directly from Haitian Compas Music and Zouk, sung generally in Portuguese, it is a genre of music with a romantic flow mixed with African rhythm.

The style of dance is often described as a mix between Argentine Tango and Bachata. Kizomba was developed in Angola late 1989 to early 1990s. It is a fusion of Semba (the predecessor of samba) with the Zouk music styles from the French Caribbean Islands. It is also performed in other lusophone African countries and in Europe.

Kizomba is also surging in popularity in the US and Canada and being featured at many Latin Dance Congresses around the world.

Source: Wikipedia