Salsa Leeches (Part 1)

You are in a salsa club and one of your favourite songs comes on. This is what you have been waiting for all day. Your heart starts racing, you feel the beat, it is pulsing in your ears, it is banging in your head. While you ease into the song you can hardly stop your excitement. The rhythm is bringing you pure joy, the synchronised steps of the other dancers brings you happiness, the music is brilliant, the lyrics elevate your mood, the song picks up, your steps get faster, you enter a spiral of ever increasing ecstasy, you lose yourself completely, you are as close to paradise on earth as you can possible get, you hope this song never ends.

However, you know in your heart that like all good things this moment will end so you want to at least go out with a bang. You prepare yourself for the final moment of the song, you know this song well so you are pretty sure you can time one of your best moves to finish on the last beat. Actually, let’s add a dip to it at the end so the move needs to start a bit earlier… 2 8-counts to go… hang on what is this?... the music seems to be changing slightly… this is definitely not the version you know… will the move still work?... the music is changing more … it is slowing down … your steps do not seem to match the rhythm any more … in fact where is the rhythm?... this is no longer enjoyable… this is no longer salsa… it becomes awkward … you look at your partner, you see the same disappointment in their eyes, you solemnly take them to the edge of the dance floor, thank them for the dance and join your friends who have all retreated, trying their best not to let the situation depress them. As you process what just happened you realise that not only did this DJ take away some of the most precious moments of one of your favourite songs and denied you the chance to practise your end-timing with one of your favourite moves but the way the song ended was so indefinite and unclear that no-one could have ended it well. This awkward transition period between the current song and the next, something that is neither salsa nor any other form of dance or music, seems to somehow justify the DJs job when being referred to as “mixing” and as much as that may even be appreciated by the average club-goer it has certainly ruined your dance. However, what takes the cake is the type of music that your favourite song has been mixed into. As much as you are trying to ignore the truth there is no more denying it: What is being played and danced at this moment in time is… Kizomba!

The feeling is to be likened to your favourite Rock band live performance being cut short by someone playing the bagpipes. It is like watching the football world cup final and 5 minutes before the end of the game all the players disappear and instead some people start to play boules. It is like being sold a tennis racket in a French restaurant or someone listening to heavy metal in a yoga class. In other words, it is not only complete and utter nonsense but in addition leaves you with this bitter taste in your mouth of being cheated.

Anyway let’s not get depressed, you think, after all you did just have an amazing song to dance to so you might consider forgiving the DJ for this one crime as long as he just gets back to salsa after this song. So you sit there, you try and close your ears and eyes, you try and ignore what is going on around you, desperately hanging on to the clave in your head which is slowly fading away. Go to your happy place, you think, surely this song will end in a few minutes and indeed it does… or did it? It’s hard to tell, this all sounds the same to you but one glance at your watch confirms your biggest fear… few Kizomba songs last 7 minutes so this is probably Kizomba song number 2. Slowly but surely you are reaching the anger stage of your grief. “Maybe the DJs will play some salsa if I shove my mp3 player down his throat,”, “Why did I pay £10 to dance and now I am sitting around?”, “The banner read – best salsa party of the year – I want my money back, this is fraud!”.

Like a high school party where the parents have come home early you see some of your friends are starting to leave quietly with an expression on their face that mirrors your feelings. “No” you think “Not tonight! I will not leave on a Kizomba song again or I will become suicidal! I will hang on until they play salsa again.” At this point your definition of salsa includes pretty much anything with a clave as long as you can dance again. Your energy is gone, your excitement is gone, your frustration is at its peak and you are only hanging on with sheer willpower. The music acts as a great lullaby and the chair is actually quite comfortable. Maybe you can just fall asleep right here and you are no longer sure whether you have the energy to drive back to your home anyway any more. You are slowly drifting into a dream about those days when salsa events meant that people were dancing salsa. Remember those times you stayed on until the end of the night and when the lights came on you still did not have enough. When you listened to salsa all the way back to your home and couldn’t fall asleep afterwards because of the incredible excitement you felt. When the debates you heard in clubs were centred around whether the music should be suitable for only cross-body salsa or Cuban salsa or an equal mix over the course of a night. When all your friends came along every night rather than staying at home as “they will only play Kizomba again anyway”. Someone bumps into you and you wake up from your trance. How many Kizomba songs has it been now…. 5 or 6? You have lost count. You are bored out of your mind and exhausted. There was a Bachata song somewhere in the middle that you almost used as an excuse to at least get yourself up again but it was just as slow so not enough to wake you up completely. This is it. You have no more energy to hang on to. Another salsa night ruined. Better luck next time –  or at least so you hope.

Paso Casino

Paso casino is the basic step in Cuban salsa literally translating to “Casino Step” in reference to this dance having originally been called Casino, with Cuban salsa being merely a neologism as per my previous posts. It is the most basic form of the dance and usually the first step people will learn when attending a new Cuban salsa class.

Paso casino is the default step people will use when dancing en parejas or en rueda before executing more complex steps and turns and it is the one step in Rueda de Casino which will never be called out loud, rather it is the step we always go back to if no other instructions are given.

The step is executed with both partners facing each other and the leader making an L-shape with his left thumb which the follower will hold on to lightly with their right hand after which the leader closes their left hand and relaxes it afterwards. This marks the open-hold position of couple dancing in Cuban salsa which is usually adapted for most of the song. For the most basic form of paso casino, leaders will step back with their left foot on 1 then step on the spot with their right foot on 2 and bring their feet together on 3 while pausing on the 4. Subsequently they will step forward with their right foot on 5, step on the spot with their left foot on 6, bring their feet together on 7 and pause again on the 8, completing one full 8-count of a salsa song. For followers the basic step is the exact mirror image of the leader stepping back with their right foot on the 1.

In general, the step can be changed in almost any way as long as the structure and timing of it is not lost so that any open hold move can be led from Casino on the 7. I.e. it is entirely possible to throw in side steps, cross over steps etc. as long as it has no impact on the dance overall and the body position is correct on the 7. Adding variations to this step are usually distinguished from the basic form by calling it Paso Casino plus the description of the variation in Spanish. I.e. one of the common variations is to open up with the body on 1 for both leader and followers which is sometimes referred to as “Paso Casino - Abre Y Cierra” meaning Casino step – open and close. This form in particular can lead to a lot of confusion as some dance schools will actually open up on the 7 which can be seen as a signal for the move Vacilala if it is not led well so incorporating this into the basic step means that there is a danger of creating ambiguity between the lead for Vacilala and the basic step.

For more complex variations of this step the name is usually changed to “Guapea” from the Spanish word guapear = acting tough, being brave, showing off. I.e Guapea roughly translates to “show off” step. In English people sometimes refer to any form of Casino as “Cuban step” or “Cuban basic” to distinguish it from cross-body salsa elements but this is not strictly speaking correct and it is needless to say that Cubans would never say Cuban basic when referring to their own dance.

As there are so many different versions of this step I have heard heated debates between students and teachers as to which version constitutes the correct “Cuban” form of the step. The truth is, however, that no form is superior to another and many Cubans will simply mix up different versions of Paso Casino within one song to make it look like their feet are constantly doing something different. The only thing that can be said is that the form described in this blog is the most basic form and even though there are many variations it is a good idea to introduce students to the absolute basic version first before adding styling elements.

Rueda Hand Signs (Part 2) Enchufla (Con La Mano Izquierda)

In the last blog I wrote on Rueda hand signs I discussed the fact that very few teachers around the world know a lot of Rueda hand signs and therefore do not use them in class, let alone discuss the history, humour or culture surrounding Rueda hand signs. This is to a large extent due to the fact that they themselves were not given this information when they attended classes and even if they have been shown a few signs, they might feel that it is better not to teach them at all than only teach a subset of the hand signs in circulation.

Another reason teachers opt out of using hand signs in class is the fact that it makes the lesson significantly harder for them as they have to simultaneously think about the hand sign, the move they are about to call, as well as the people in the Rueda etc. This can overload even experienced callers quickly. Sometimes it might just be that the hands are not free to signal a certain move or teachers feel that they are not being watched by students anyway so they do not bother signalling the move.

However, none of these points are good enough reasons to call Ruedas without the hand signs and it is in fact the increased difficulty that makes overcoming this challenge such a great achievement and a rewarding exercise when a teacher can add this to their skillset.
On the other hand, the increased communication as well as the humorous and cultural aspects that come with signalling Rueda moves make students have an even better experience when dancing Rueda de Casino, not to mention the increased respect they feel for the teacher in mastering this skill.

I have often been approached by students after class who mention that they have been to many Cuban salsa classes without seeing a Rueda being executed with all the moves being signalled from start to finish. Similarly, a lot of the questions and discussions people have with me around Cuban salsa involve hand signs and their history, meaning etc. rather than specific steps of a move or body movement advise etc. so it is clearly an aspect that many people are very interested in despite the fact that it is usually neglected by Cuban salsa classes around the world.

The hand sign I would like to introduce this week is that for “Enchufla Con La Mano Izquierda” which involves the left hand forming a fist which is then being pulled down like sounding the horn of a lorry. While this is one of the oldest and most widely used hand signs internationally and often one of the only signs people know in Rueda, its origin has to my knowledge not been documented in any way (please do let me know if you are aware of any source that describes how this sign has come to be used for “Enchufla”). As a result there are now various theories as to where this hand sign came from. I.e. I have heard this sign being discussed as a reference to the warning signal that might be exchanged between two lorries when they are about to pass each other on a narrow street or going around a bend similarly to when we execute Enchufla in a busy club i.e. we have to pass each other in a narrow space so we need to stay close together and avoid crashing into each other or the other dancers on the dance floor.
On the other hand, I have heard this being a reference to lorry drivers sometimes sounding their horn when seeing a woman they find attractive meaning that the signal is a reference to the sexual innuendo the move can suggest (i.e. the move can be translated as “plug her in”) rather than describing the motion we perform.
While its obvious similarity to sounding an air horn in a lorry has supported the rumours that it is in fact a signal relating to reasons that cause lorry drivers to honk, as far as I know these theories are all based on hearsay and I have never seen any documentation of any kind that would support one theory over another.

Rueda Hand Signs (Part 1) Dame

Ever since I started dancing Cuban salsa and discovered the Rueda de Casino aspect of the dance, I have been fascinated by the fact that Cuban salsa moves not only have a Spanish name which can be very descriptive, informative, funny or at times even cheeky, but also that all of these moves have a hand sign associated with them which often add another humorous or cultural component to this dance.

There are many advantages of using hand signs in Ruedas, many of which will be discussed in later posts but the most obvious benefit is the fact that when the Rueda is large or the music is loud i.e. in a salsa club, then dancers will be able to follow the hand signs of the cantante - the caller - even if they do not hear the move being shouted. This factor in itself makes Rueda signs extremely important as most Ruedas involve big groups of people, and their surrounding environment is almost always noisy to the degree that using hand signs will immediately improve the communication between the cantante and the dancers in the Rueda. I.e. I have rarely been in a Rueda of more than 10 people where I got the impression that every person in the Rueda was able to hear all the moves being called throughout the entire song. Just a few weeks ago I went to a salsa night which started with a Rueda class with around 30 students. While the class was well taught and people were able to follow the moves during class, it all fell apart when the teacher tried to lead the Rueda a few hours later during social dancing simply because he did not use hand signs. Even though he was calling the moves as loud as he could, the noise of the music, the other people dancing, the bar staff working, people on the side talking to each other etc. meant that only the couples in the vicinity of the teacher could understand the moves while about 70% of the Rueda could not hear anything he shouted.

This is just one example which demonstrates the importance of Rueda hand signs and I have therefore always been interested in this aspect of the dance just as much as the names of the moves or even the moves themselves. Sadly, it is one of the least known aspects of Cuban salsa and I have been to many dance schools which never teach a single hand sign or even just inform their students that these exist. Most of the time the teachers do not know the hand signs themselves or just know a very small selection of hand signs which they might throw in randomly. I.e. I have been dancing in Ruedas where the cantante calls “Sombrero” and signals the move with the correct hand sign followed up by another move i.e. “Exhibela” where they will call the move without using the hand sign simply because they only know a select few signs. This type of inconsistent behaviour is of course misleading and confusing to students and will mean that in a noisy environment the whole Rueda would only be able to do the moves that they can hear.

I have found this aspect frustrating from the very beginning of dancing Cuban salsa and have hardly been to Ruedas where all the moves were called as well as signalled during the entirety of the song, but it has inspired me to collect all the hand signs I could find and ask teachers for all the details they had around hand signs every time I went to a new class, Rueda, performance etc. I have been dancing in many different places both at home as well as abroad since I started my interest in Rueda hand signs. This has allowed me to collect more of these than any other person I know and through the dance school I now run with Aimi I have shown them alongside every move I ever taught making sure that Ruedas contain both the names as well as the hand signs from start to finish. It is my sincere hope that through this blog and my dance classes more and more people will come to realise the clear advantages that hand signs bring in Ruedas so that they find wider acceptance, enhancing everybody’s experience while dancing in Rueda de Casino.

The first hand sign I want to introduce is the one for “Dame” where the cantante will use his free hand (usually the right hand) to wave backwards once as if to say “come closer”. This is a very descriptive sign as “Dame” literally means “Give me” meaning “give me another partner” so we are effectively signalling the next person in the Rueda to come closer to their respective leader. Another interpretation is that the waving hand is supposed to be taken as having originated from one of the many synonyms for “Dame” that can be called in the Rueda namely “Botala” which means “Chuck her”. In this context the idea is that we forget our current partner and move on to the next “chucking our current partner away” (all part of Cuban humour, do not execute this literally please!). I.e. it is the same hand sign people use in daily life when you hear them say “whatever” meaning they do not care about this current task, situation, problem etc. and want to move on to the next.