Just like the hot and spicy salsa dip, Salsa is a beautiful blend of various Latin dance forms, including tango, flamenco, and mambo, with each region contributing its flavor to the dance form. Generally, Salsa is a partner style dance form performed on a piece of specific salsa music. This dance brings in sensuousness and dramatics in the picture, which general western dance styles do not possess. However, it can be presented on a solo level as well. Today it is a world popular dance form thrilling both club dancers and professional competitors twisting with Cuban motion for millions of its fans.

It is a stunning and eye-catching dance form prevailing around the dancing community for more than 100 years. The history of salsa dance stretches back to the Cuban Island. When various musical styles, such as Mambo, Son Montuno, and African, came together on Cuba’s island, the music and dance styles of salsa originated. Cuban-Son and AfroAmerican Rumba were the two basic styles that became the foundation of what we now call as Salsa. Being an amalgam of ingredients of various forms of music and dance, Salsa brings in an improvising factor with itself, as a dancer can pair Salsa with any other dance style gracefully. It also incorporated various local influences like American Jazz and more as it moved further around the globe.

The first official label, who brought Salsa to fame, was Fania Records by Johnny Pacheco and Italian-American lawyer Jerry Masucci. By the time they produced the artists who are world-renowned as the ‘Legends of Salsa.’ Some of them are Celia Cruz, Hector Lavoe, Ruben Blades, Cheo Feliciano, and many more. Not just the artists, they also induced some changes to the Cuban music to manifest it more presentably to the New York Latin community.

Salsa itself is composed of various types, as per the place from where it comes from. We have Salsa Casino (Cuban style), Salsa Casino (Miami style), L.A. style, Afro-Latino style, Rueda de Casino, New York-style, and Cali style (Colombian salsa). This many variations of one dance form came as the style made its move from continent to continent. Along with this, change in the rhythm and music instruments also brought varied styles.

At Star Dance Company we work with L.A. Style or Cross Body Salsa. This style is highly influenced by Hollywood (as the name L.A. suggests) and by the Swing and Mambo dance forms. L.A. dance form primarily works on bringing out the sensuousness and theatrical feeling within ourselves.

L.A. dance form is danced on a line and start to move on the first beat of the music; hence its other name is L.A. Style Salsa on 1. In this, the performers dance in the quick-quick-slow, quick-quick-slow pattern. Generally, ample space is provided to the female dancer. Also, there is more space for individual styling.

The stepping stones of this dance are the forward/backward basics and the cross-body lead. The basics follow the 8 counts steps.

In this dance form, the focus of the movement is on the lower part of the body, as the upper part remains leveled. Its an elegant and amusing form of cardio, which helps to achieve the overall body strength. While keeping good footwork helps maintain the legs, hips, and glutes, holding the upper body posture intact leads to exceptional arms and core strength.

Salsa Dance form and music style possess the deep Caribbean and African roots. It’s prevalent in almost all Latin America and among Latino communities in the United States. In current years, this dance has also gained popularity in Europe and in Asia. In India, people are also getting familiar with this dance form as it helps in socializing dancers and performers among themselves and with other people around the globe. The salsa rhythm keeps itself aside from other dance forms for being catchy, sensual, and easy to learn, yet very difficult to master.