Cuban salsa continues to develop and the number of moves in existence today are well into the thousands even if no-one knows for sure how many moves there are. It is increasingly difficult to come up with new names and hand signs for new moves as well as their variations and while a lot of the original move names and signs were often humorous or meaningful and usually came with an origin story, in recent years a lot of the move names and hand signs have been less well conceived.
Some systems have emerged where moves are named after people, places or numbers and while the original moves still had a meaning (i.e. dancers form the shape of a seventy with their arms when performing the move Setenta and the move Echevarria is believed to have been invented by someone whose surname was Echevarria) there are no obvious meanings behind some of the more modern moves that follow this system (i.e. Setenta y Cinco contains no element that looks like a five so this is believed to have been named simply based on the fact that it is a variation of Setenta and the name Setenta y Cinco was still available at the time – it is like saying let's do the fifth variation of Setenta).
A similar naming convention has emerged where moves are called after places supposedly based on the fact that the move was invented in a particular town or region or that the person who invented the move had an association with a certain place. Since little is known about when and where a certain Cuban salsa move was invented, let alone who invented it, it is hard to say whether this line of thought really does hold true for a significant number of moves that were named after places. However, given that Bayamo is one of the oldest and most original moves that were named after a place it is highly likely that the move was invented in Bayamo or by a dancer or dance group from Bayamo.
Bayamo is the capital of the Granma province and one of the largest cities in Cuba. It is associated among other things with the national anthem of Cuba called “La Bayamesa” or “El Himno de Bayamo” first performed at the Battle of Bayamo and composed by Perucho Figueredo. Hand signs for moves named after places are usually something descriptive with respect to the place they are used for. In the case of Bayamo the caller will usually touch their left shoulder with their right hand and then bring the right hand in the air towards his right hand side to signal a salute most probably in reference to La Bayamesa i.e. saluting the country with respect to the national hymn or even a symbol to signal a soldier’s salute relating back to the Battle of Bayamo.
To see a video of the move Bayamo as well as the hand sign, please click on: https://youtu.be/VZsa1qDMUtA
