Salsa Connection - Part 1 Introduction to the Salsa Connection Blog Series
Salsa Connection
Part I: Introduction to the Salsa Connection Blog Series
I clearly remember the exact moment when it finally dawned on me, although I’d known it for a long time. It was last December. Elise Butler, my former salsa student and frequent dance partner, was home from New York University, where she is a student, for the winter holidays. During the holiday we had only an hour or so to meet, catch up, and dance a little. We chatted a bit over coffee and then turned on the music to dance salsa. As we danced the familiar joy and ease of dancing together quickly returned. I never fail to be amazed at how great it is to really dance with another person and dancing with Elise is really fun. The moment came when in the middle of leading Elise in a simple right turn I was suddenly inspired to change it into a left turn. I was astounded that Elise followed this without a hitch or jerk. She smiled to show her pleasure at executing this surprise lead. We were truly connected in our dancing; we had what I call the salsa connection.
I couldn’t get this moment off my mind all winter and increasingly began to appreciate and articulate what I already knew: the joyous fun smooth effortless salsa dancing simply cannot be done without having the skill to create with your partner the salsa connection. This is as true for girls as for guys, for follows as well as leads. I see it also as fundamental to social dancing and, I’ll be bold here, it is also a metaphor for all relationships.
Appreciating the importance of the salsa connection has changed the way I teach salsa dancing. I see it as the most important thing I have discovered about salsa dancing, the inspiration for a major development in my teacing, and amazingly it now begins to resonate with almost everything in my life. As Elise and I have developed our teaching of salsa in our summer offering called, not surprisingly, Salsa Connection, I am finding that the students in my classes and my private students are all greatly appreciating the concept and more so experiencing the results. All find it important to their dancing and to their lives.
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What is the salsa connection and why don’t we get it?
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Touch and the salsa connection
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Negotiating the salsa connection
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Eye contact and the salsa connection
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Music and the salsa connection
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Teaching equally to follows and leads via the salsa connection
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Salsa connection from a relationship perspective—for men
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Salsa connection from a relationship perspective—for women
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Flow and the salsa connection
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Existential Phenomenology and the salsa connection (Yikes!)
Take the Salsa Challenge! Experience the Salsa Connection!
Great Article !!!!
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Sam and Jenny,
Awesome series of articles !
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