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Make your own kind of music


For me, the Holy Grail of dancing is not fancy moves and styling; it's musicality. The simplest and subtlest moves, breaks, drifts, pops and shimmies become little moments of dance ecstasy when danced in response to the music. They are great alone and even better with a partner! 

Easier said than done. When you dance salsa, there is a lot going on. You need to time your moves, focus on technique, lead or follow, and be aware of the dance floor. That's a lot to think about. Do you have to think about musicality as well?! 

Add to all that the complexity of salsa music. Unless you were born in a Latin American country or into a household of salsa lovers, your first musical language is not salsa. It is, if you were born in the UK in the last sixty or so years, probably pop or rock of some sort. You absorbed solid 4/4 timing from before you were born. You bounced to it as a baby. You jumped up and down to it in school discos. You tap the steering wheel to it as you drive. You still bop about to it on a night out, at weddings, and in the privacy of your own living room. You know when the verse is over and whether the chorus will be repeated. You know when a key change is coming. You know when the beat will drop. It is inside most of us, to some degree. You know it as unconsciously as you know your first language. 


Salsa is a little more complicated, especially if you are learning it as a second language. There are a few ways to improve musicality. These are the ones I know:

  • Listen to a whole lot of salsa music. Like anything, exposure makes a difference. However, this takes a long time and I don't actually like listening to salsa music if I'm not dancing. 

  • Learn footwork and body movement patterns that take you off the basic 123, 567 count. Then, practise them until they are in your muscle memory. Eventually, these movements will become part of your repertoire and they will emerge when the music calls for them in a social dance. The Salsa Bangor Saturday Workshops are good for this. I also do occasional group lessons which focus on footwork and body movement. If you want to improve your musicality in one-to-one lessons, I can do this too. 

  • Play with other types of music. Try dancing salsa to music you are more familiar with. Your innate knowledge of your favourite pop songs will change how you dance the steps and moves you've learnt in salsa. 

Let's explore the last point in more detail because it can be a game-changer and it is the most fun. You will immediately feel more relaxed because of the familiarity of the music. This will free up your body and mind and make you more playful. You will not be searching for the 1. You will not be thrown off course by a break in the music. You will know when the track builds up and you will know how hard to go on the chorus. Your body will respond to the instrumental bits. Your moves will slow down and smooth out as the music does, and they will speed up and sharpen in the dramatic moments and crescendos. You will stretch out steps to fit the beat. You will style out the big emotional moments. You will match your salsa knowledge to your love of the tracks you grew up with and actually choose to listen to. 

To be clear, this is not an endorsement of salsa mash-up versions of Ed Sheeran songs, nor of the aberrations they call salsa on Strictly Come Dancing. I believe that we should dance to rich, intricate, and well-produced salsa music in all its flavours. The dance and the music go hand in hand for a reason. This is just an exercise in relaxing into musicality. Remember, you've learned moves and have a lot of info, but it's still dancing. That means responding to the music.

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