Learning Salsa

This article is a first draft for trying to explain or reinforce key concepts about Rueda de Casino to those who are already learning rueda -- input is very welcome.

Part 3 of Awareness

What is “your space”? For want of a better definition, your space is the area that is more or less reasonable for you and your partner to use on the dance floor. Generally speaking in club dancing, that space is a rectangle with a line running down the center where you and your partner stick. In formal terms, this is called “slot-dancing” and it is generally the best way to make a predictable and comfortable dance space. The key for dancing in the slot is drawing these imaginary lines -- North, South, East & West -- and following them without fail.

The Slot

Probably everyone has heard of "the slot", but not many of us dance with a real awareness of it. Most styles of salsa dictate that you move in straight lines. Every cross body lead, enchufla, and turn must start and finish on the lines. For leaders, that means getting out of your partner's way (being exactly perpendicular) and establishing a clear path that can only be followed one way. For followers it means following that line and staying within the boundaries your partner is trying to set. Dancing with this awareness and control will not only make you safer, it will improve your turns and make everything you do even better.

After a few too many accident reports at our March social, we are declaring April Awareness month at YA Salsa. While, its fortunately pretty rare that anyone is seriously hurt, it's too common that people end up wincing in pain from footsteps or the occasional collision.

Dancing safely isn't just for crowded dance floors – the floor often gets crazier when there is lots of room and couples start pulling out all their favorite yet unperfected moves. Regardless, some simple principles apply and over the next few weeks, we will try to cover them all. The point here is not to make the dancing boring or preach: The point is to make it a better experience for everyone.

There are a lot of things to cover, so we'll break them out into separate articles over the next month:

• Be Aware
• Protect Your Partner
• Dance in Your Space
• Step Lightly & Turn Tightly
• Watch the Dips, Drops, Tricks & Kicks

Part 2 of Awareness

As said before, your fundamental responsiblity when dancing is to protect your partner.

• Protect your partner from you and other dancers
• Protect the other dancers from you and your partner

That means protection from footsteps, collissions, elbows and falls. While most of the responsiblity for this falls squarely on the shoulder's of the leader, dancing is a partnership and it takes both parties to make it work.

Read whole article...

Part 1 of Awarenesss

Many times people say that they need more room to dance and how much better things would be if there were more room to dance. But really what is needed is more awareness and more control. Dancing in a crowded space is one of the most difficult dance skills to develop. It takes serious time in the club setting to get used to the dynamics of the floor. But when you are around good dancers in a packed club and everyone is doing their thing (without colliding) - there's nothing like it.