(That will tweak some people, and there are plenty of exceptions, but overall it's true.)

Part of it is the salsa instructing community is overall less mature than the WCS teaching community. Based on my experience, Salsa classes and workshops tend to focus on the ability to incorporate spins and arm-twisting patterns into a certain number of 8-counts, without much reference to when those moves will actually fit the music.Īm I wrong? Am I missing something? I'd be interested to hear the thoughts of other Salsa dancers, as well as any WCS dancers who happen to be lurking on this forum. Similarly, I saw many fewer closed-holds in WCS, and the open position (or being completely apart) would therefore allow each partner more freedom to do footwork and playful body movement. Moreover, as part of that culture, body movement and footwork seem to take precedence over spinning as a way to express the music in WCS, even among the well-trained dancers. One of my personal theories is that at the most fundamental level, the WCS 'culture' must value musical expression much more than the Salsa world. I started to notice that even with all the great clips of social Salsa dancing on places like YouTube and, much of the musicality in Salsa dancing occurs in spurts, rather than all the way through the song. There's a thread here in DF asking for clips of musicality during social dancing in Salsa, and it was much harder to do than I anticipated (which is what got me to thinking about the dichotomy between Salsa and WCS). It also struck me how easy it was to find such clips of great musicality involving social dancers, spontaneous demonstrations, and/or Jack & Jill competitions - i.e., not just in rehearsed/choreographed routines. I also noticed that while plenty of Salsa dancers can do 'tricks' or hit the big musical breaks/accents, the WCS dancers seem to do a much better job of playing with the little beats all the way through the song. In WCS, it looks like the instances of 3+ spins are reserved for once or twice during a song, and where it fits what's actually happening with the music. One of the big things I noticed among the WCS clips was that although the more-skilled women are obviously capable of performing multiple spins, it's much less a part of their dancing than among 'top' Salseros, where it seems like there's a multiple-spin after every handful of 8-counts (regardless of what's happening musically). :?ĭo you think it has to do with the structure of Salsa music? Do we not have enough accessibility to musical dancing role models in our various Salsa communities? Is there something about the culture of Salsa dancers that doesn't allow us to 'think outside the box' on a regular basis, so that we're stuck doing the same old patterns/moves? Or, do you disagree with my premise, and you think that Salsa dancers are just as musical as West Coast Swing dancers in general? Here are just a few examples that I really liked:ĭoes anybody have any theories about why it's rare to see such musicality in Salsa dancers? I realize that the above examples include various professionals in the the WCS world, but I still don't see as much creativity among Salsa professionals when they are put on the spot to freestyle. After viewing a ton of clips containing West Coast Swing, I've come to one conclusion - collectively, WCS dancers kick our (Salsa dancers') butts! Hard. Currently, there are several threads floating around & regarding musicality during social/improvisational dancing, including references to video clips of Salsa and West Coast Swing.

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