Salsa Improv : Liz and Junior (SF2006 Jack and Jill Finals)

 Here is part of the final dance of the San Francisco Salsa Congres 2006 Jack and Jill Masters competition. This is Junior (from Junior and Emily) and Liz (from Salsamania) doing completely improvised dancing for the crowd! Again, in a Jack and Jill competition you do not know before hand who your dance partner will be, so that is why all this dancing is improvised. 

Salsa Improv : Tamara and John (SF2006 Jack and Jill Finals)

 This is the final dance by Tamara (from Tito and Tamara) and John (from Salsamania) at the San Francisco Salsa Congress 2006 Jack and Jill Masters competition. This is ALL IMPROVISED! Awesome salseros! … (more) For those who do not know what a Jack and Jill competition is, it is where you don't know who your partner will be (because they mix up the follows and leaders).. and because of that, the dancing is completely on the spot improvised, especially if the two of you have never danced before.

Salsa Congress Masters – salsa improv at its best!

This is a set of clips of the San Francisco 2006 Salsa Congress Jack and Jill Masters competition. Some of the best salsa dancers in the world came are here and showed us why they are the best. All this dancing is improvised! No smoke and mirrors here! I think the most interesting thing to see is how everyone has their own style, and they are all great and fun to watch and enjoy! Culmination of salsa styles!

Salsa Mechanics 101 : This is your brian… and this is your brain on salsa…

I found this article very interesting…. it explains why at the beginning of learning salsa, its difficult to multi task your motor skills. This is also scientific proof of why learning to follow is much easier than learning to lead… Learning to follow requires the use of the sense of touch (which according to the published research – the brain can easily handle because it is directly connected to the motor processing part of the brain). However leading requires the images of the actions (planning and forming motor actions) be kept in the leads head followed my multiple motor skill actions – which the brain cannot easily do at the same time. (it has to keep track of how the leads feet are placed, timing of music, planning the next move, how the move should look, the follows feet, the hands to lead the move…etc). It says that the reason we are able to do this is because by forcing our brain to perform all these activities repeatedly, it ends up turning all these different tasks into just one. So as an example, crossbody lead – instead of thinking, ok, step forward, step side, open up, lead the lady across, and come back together on 7 and basic step… we just think – cross-body lead (so we don't have to "plan" for a cross-body lead just let our muscles execute it) and our brain is then free to do 'other' things such as adding styling and flavor.

Article: http://whyfiles.org/shorties/220square_circle/
(And not for the faint of heart, here are the papers:

http://www.personal.psu.edu/dar12/Publications/Publications_06_w.htm )

"The experiment, published in the November/December Journal of Experimental Psychology, proved that the limitation is neither in the muscles nor in the part of nervous system that communicates directly with them, Rosenbaum says. "Instead, we have come to the idea that the source of the limitation is conceptual, it's not in the execution." When asked to draw a square and circle, "you need to keep those two forms in mind, and that's hard for us to do."

Touch input goes to a part of the brain called the somatosensory cortex, which is directly connected to the motor cortex, Rosenbaum explains. And apparently these two areas are happy to trace squares and circles without help (or hindrance!) from the brain's intellectual center, the prefrontal cortex, which makes plans and carries them out.

So how, for example, do musicians do two things at once? "It turns out that very, very few people can carry out two differently timed activities totally independently," says Rosenbaum. "If you sing while playing guitar, over time, you learn to think of them as a single task."

And the Award of He-Man goes to….

Now, this video does not have salsa in it – just to warn those expecting it. However, this performance was done at the San Francisco salsa congress 2006, and to tell you the truth – it was one of the craziest performances I've ever seen. This guy is F@!#$% He-man! To tell you the truth, when he came out with that outfit on the stage.. I was like, ok.. this might not be good. I was completely BLOWN away and I'm glad someone took a video of a video (which trust me it does not do any justice having it seen LIVE). Anyway, enjoy! Here is Dave Paris & Zoie!

And of course, what would Congress be without the comedic version of that routine by Ismael Otero and friends.

Frankie Martinez – another perspective (literally)

I'd like to thank Patrick for submitting this video. Even though it was taken in a nightshot fashion, the perspective is very good so you can see the footwork style of Frankie Martinez dancing salsa. Its good to note that his fast/slippery footwork does not affect his height or his lead.

Salsa Tip #331 : Dipping dots…. and ladies..

Well, I've done dips before… but I hardly do them at the club. And the main reason for this salsa tip is because I see a LOT of beginners trying to do dips in salsa, when they are barely trying to get the basic step down.

Doing big dips in a club is a very dangerous game. Now, there is a difference between doing a small dip, and a large elaborated? dip. Small dips are fine, the lady doesn't go down much (and doesn't feel like she has to break her back). However, with large dips – its tricky and risky.

The floor is crowded. One time, when I decided to do a dip to this cute girl I was trying to impress, it ended up being that another guy next to me was doing a dip as well. For some statistical reason, we ended up doing the dip in opposite directions (and similar dip) so that the girls ended up hitting their heads. Yeah.. real smooth.. (sarcasm). Well, then I realized that when the floor is this packed, you will probably never want to do dips like that so you don't accidentally injure your follower. For these, you might as well do a standing up dip (not sure what they are called).

Don't operate heavy machinery. It will be the case that the ladies might not know how to perform a correct dip. In a good dip, the lady basically holds her own weight (and does not launch herself on the floor for you to catch her and support her – while not breaking your lower back). Some ladies think that its up to the guy to magically work against the laws of physics to perform the dip – and trust me, it doesn't work. Either you'll get injured, or she'll be on the floor. So, before you try a dip, make sure you feel like you are with a comfortable dancer that understands dips. Like in the picture shown on the right – that is not a good dip.

Find a good spot in the song. If you are going to do a dip on a given dance in a given song – try to do it to a song that you know that might have an accentuated pause, or drawn out instrument piece. Why? Well, you can't just do a dip anywhere. If you try to do a dip in the regular beats of the song, it looses some of the feeling of how your body moves with the music. In addition, you might end up doing the dip either too fast or too slow to maintain synchronization with the song, which will make the dip look sloppy.

A hand in head support. If you are doing a dip, where the lady's head is going down – my biggest tip is to use your free hand and give her some head support by placing your palm behind her head (as if it was like a pillow) so she doesn't feel a type of 'whiplash' effect when doing the dip. Trust me, it will make the dip feel 100x more comfortable. (again, thats why I say that the picture shown is a bad dip).

 All in all, dipping is about one main thing: making the dance end with graceful closure. How to make that happen is two things: make the lady comfortable when dipping and make her feel secure. Remember, the dip is for her, and not for the audience. Simple, comfortable and elegant dips are the best.

[UPDATED] The easiest way to get into a dip is to do a cross-body lead with a turn, and into a simple dip.

Sexy San Diego Salseras (MiM Ladies Team Performance) [UPDATED]

This is the Majesty In Motion Ladies Only Dance Team. It seems that I'm currently doing a lot of plugs for Majesty dances, but its just that there are finally some performances that I can actually get video for. While, that is true, this team (IMHO) has some of the prettiest ladies and best female dancers in San Diego. It is their first performance of their new routine – and while the team is MUCH bigger, this is just a few that were available to perform at this event – the Salsa Saturdays at the La Jolla Marriott. The choreography was directed by Jennifer Stein. Because I do not know all the names of the performers, I will not post any of them (hopefully someone can send me the list, and then I'll post the performers names).

[UPDATED] : IMHO = In My Humble Opinion, and the performers names are: Nicole, Gaby, Liya, Marilyn, Lisa, and Chelsea.

Majesty in Motion ‘Suenalo’ Performance…

Here is the video of the 'Suenalo' performance for the pre-thanksgiving event/party at the Lafayette Hotel. This routine was worked on for around 3-4 months and choreographed by David Stein from Majesty in Motion. Performers are from back row to front, left to right: Javier and Erica, Alex and Sydel, Ben and Tomoko, (then in front) Dan and Genny and Anthony Persaud (me) and Lily. Enjoy and happy thanksgiving!

Some cool freestyle footwork moves (improv)…

This is a pretty cool video clip of Griselle, Yesenia, Cesar, and Junior doing some neat footwork freestyle moves for the students at a workshop they were giving. It seemed like it was a last minute thing but, it still looks great and fun to watch. You might want to lower the volume due to screaming… hahah

San Francisco 2006 Salsa Congress Gallery [UPDATED]

So, finally I posted most of the pictures I was able to take during my time at the San Francisco Salsa Congress 2006. It was an incredible event with great performances, amazing social dancing (lots of people) and just great workshops. If you ever get a chance to go to a Salsa Congress you must! (I'm going to Palm Spring and Chicago Salsa Congress next).

Anyway, it was a weekend packed of greatness and it was worth every penny put into it. Everytime I come out of a congress I feel like I've become a better dancer. If it was like a stock price, it would be like during the year you might be a little flat, and then you go to salsa congress, and all of a sudden you stock price just jumps and skyrockets upward.

Anyway, you can check out the full-fledged gallery by clicking on the image on the left. That way you can check out most of those pictures. I will be posting up some of the Jack-n-Jill videos of the instructors dancing with other instructors during a contest. Until then.. enjoy! 

[UPDATE] Fixed the stupid IE problem.  Thanks to Erica for the feedback!

Troy and Iran dancing together…

Well, since I had posted a previous video of two girls dancing… I was asked to see if I could find a cool video of two guys dancing. While I couldn't find a video of Jayson Molina dancing with another guy – I got the next best thing – Troy and Iran. I think its pretty good and fun to share. And for those who are wondering – no there is no shame in dancing with another guy.

Performance at the First Salsa Congress ever!

As you can see in this video – its an old video. It is from the first ever salsa congress in history. The first salsa congress took place in the home of salsa : Puerto Rico (around 2000). Here is Franklin Diaz and Yesenia Peralta performing one of the favorite routines of the show. She is considered to be the "JLo of Salsa" – (Jennifer Lopez = JLo).

Salsa Tip #265 : Don’t just say NO…

I wrote this late night, so hopefully its coherent… I'll fix it later.

Yeah, this is a small tip – mainly for the ladies. First off, men have a tough job at the dance. Take out the dancing part, and we are left with getting 'approved' or 'rejected' by the ladies who want to dance. Now, ladies, I'll tell you the truth – it requires courage to ask one of you to dance and wait for an approval or rejection. Not only that, during the dance (if you end up saying yes), we have to meet your minimum expectations of what you consider 'FUN'…. so… imagine if you had to do it, how tough it would be. However, most of us have asked ladies out to dance so many times (and have had enough rejections) to have our emotions hard as a rock (and you wonder why guys are less emotional… the ladies cause us to be this way.. ). 

Anyways, I can tell you ladies, for every guy you turn down – the word goes around. Its not a bad thing or a good thing. It depends how you turn the guy asking you. Here are a couple of suggestions to make yourself have a nicer reputation on the dance floor than other ladies.

First of all, if you don't want to dance in a given while or song, step further away from the dance floor. Make it obvious that you are taking a break (maybe by sitting down or getting some water). That helps us weed out the ladies to ask (remember, for us is first come first served).

If we ask you to dance, don't just say no – give us a stupid reason. I rather hear 'I'm tired', or "I'm with my boyfriend" than just a plain no. It just seems nicer that you actually have a valid reason (men are logical creatues) than just a 'no'. Most likely if you just say 'no' your salsa stock price will plummet.

Last but not least as another quick tip (my favorite one). If we ask you to dance, and you do say no for a specific reason, or you say 'maybe later' – don't wait for us to ask twice. Come find us and show us that when you rejected us before 'because you were tired' or 'maybe later' was not just a blow off excuse. Finding us and asking us to dance will considerably make up for the previous rejection that night. It will show you care and I can guarantee that your reputation will go up and that next time you say no for any reason, no guy would be mad because they know you mean well.

The sexy and sensual bachata just like God intended…

Well, I've been asked how the song that I put for the week (Lamento Boliviano [bachata version]) can be danced to bachata (some people thought it sounded more like cha-cha). Well, here is a cool video of what good, smooth and sexy bachata looks like from a couple video taping themselves. Ladies, if you can move like this on the dance floor (especially in a bachata song) – men will literally form a line around you! Hopefully the girls can grab a couple of tricks of this sexy mover in this video.

Again, bachata is one of those dances that is not about combinations and footwork, but about body motions. Now salsa has its own body motions, but bachata is more about smooth and slow motions – I consider it a sexier version of tango. Its about connecting and moving as one.

Now that I think of it, dancing bachata for me… its kind of like sex.. except that I actually get to do it.

 

Salsa Tip #90 : Creating your own practice floor on a budget

So maybe you've been in this situation… You want to practice in your apartment or home, but its mainly carpet. Also, getting wooden floor panels costs too much. Well, there is a simple solution (thanks to Alex for this tip). Go to Staples or Office Max and get a couple of those plastic office floor matts. This makes it perfect because you get the smoothness of a regular dance floor, but with the portability of… well.. plastic sheets.

 You can lay multiple of them over an area (hopefully in front of a mirror so you can practice your footwork with your dance shoes – of course, without ruining your carpet. (Don't try high heels). Also, limiting yourself to 1 mat will help you get better at controlling your 'spread' which is the distance that your body moves when doing footwork. (Well, I call it the spread which is a investing (stock) term). That way when you are a club, you have learned how to do patterns, combos and footwork in very little space without hitting your dancing neighbors.

Another true classic – Devorame Otra Vez

Again, this is a true classic that every salsero/salsera must have hear at some point in their salsa life… This is another one of those songs that I grew up with and also taught myself salsa with (easy to find the downbeat).  Its the famous (may I add Puerto Rican), Lalo Rodriguez singing 'Devorame Otra Vez' – which means (for those non-spanish speaking dancers) – "Devour me one more time". yes, it does have a sexual connotation – but then again.. don't we love salsa being that way?

The musical magic of Lavoe – Alejate de Mi

Well, since I posted a "El Gran Combo " (my favorite band) video before, I decided to post one of my favorite songs from my favorite artist: "Hector Lavoe". Here he is singing one of my VERY favorite songs (ever) called "Alejate De Mi" – which means "Move away from me", "Stay away from me", or "Get away from me". Now, I'm probably a big sucker for old videos (the golden age of salsa), but I just love how they sound, and how they dressed – wishing I lived through those times. I specifically like this song very much because of the good timing for dance, mixture of descarga, solos and vocals – and especially lyrics. This is such a classic and it has the feel of a good classic salsa song – (not those modern sounding ones). Of course, Hector's voice just makes this song even greater with his own voice and improvisations (called 'descargas'). The full song can be found in podcast Episode 22 . ( ). This is just a short clip of the whole song, but I recommend listening to the whole thing, and hopefully you'll see the magic of good lyrics, good rhythms, vocals, solos and descargas. Here is the full song for your enjoyment!

Al LiquidSilver and Karla Espinoza (from LA)

Another great performers from Los Angeles, CA. They are some of the very best dancers in LA (and they host a lot of Congresses, including the Palm Springs Salsa Congress that I went to this past summer). Here you get to see them 'regular' dance. I mention it like that because you get to see the "LiquidSilver" that I like, with the cool body motions. I like their performances because they are fun to watch – more than just dancing, which always makes it more entertaining.

You know you can be a better lead when….

..when a lady can lead better than you on the dancefloor. Well, of course, in this case we have Magna and Claudia Vazquez dancing together, but its cool to see ladies lead for a change. I mean, there are not complex moves here, but its about seeing execution and smoothness – of course, its sexy  interesting to watch two women dance together. And in case of those of you that are wondering, yes, guys dance together too (just go to congress ). I've been the 'woman' before, and it is hard work – cause once you are so used to leading, its hard letting go of control and just being aware of where to follow…
"Magna & Claudia Vazquez at the north west salsa congress, Guys, you know you have to get better at your dance when a girl can lead better than you. This is incentive for all of us!"