For Puerto Ricans in particular, but also Latinos generally, salsa represented a kind of liberation from the cultural and political dilemmas of this time, a liberation that was experienced on several distinct levels:. My analysis of salsa as liberation is informed by Jamaican-British cultural theorist Stuart Hall who looks at how popular culture responds to problems of power relations. Similarly I am interested in showing how salsa made such a difference. But, what is salsa? Salsa is dancing music that borrows its forms, both musical and lyrical, from the extensive Afro-Caribbean popular music vernacular, more specifically from the Cuban son, rumba, and guaracha.
It became a movement for social change and national recognition. Its lyrics sang about the struggles of the poor and the stuff of life itself. Salsa as liberation. What was videotaped at the Cheetah, and subsequently distributed internationally, was one of the most cherished activities for Latinos generally and Puerto Ricans especially -- dancing.
For groups of people under the bondage of colonialism this feeling of freedom is particularly intense, and often becomes a matter of survival. Its thrill comes from its challenge, from the mastery of sophisticated relationships between sound, time and body. The bond that unites dancers and listeners at a salsa performance is expressed in the concept of afinque [1] , the tight locking of the various rhythmic layers, melodies, and harmonies in a salsa ensemble and the close relationship between dancer and musician.
It is the most important quality in a band because it moves the audience to dance and listen enthusiastically. A salsa ensemble endeavors to play in this interlocking manner and to feel the pleasure this musical communication provides, an important value of the community where salsa developed.
When a salsa band plays afincao [2] , it gains power over the ears of its listeners and the bodies of its dancers creating a magical communion between audience, dancers and musicians. In addition to afinque, the new style called salsa was defined by new sonorities—aggressive instruments, and an impetuous sound that was harsh, like daily life itself in the Barrios of New York and other big cities.
It is the very human resources that are enacted to constitute the reality of social life in sound. Style is itself the accomplishment, the crystallization of personal and social participation; it is the way the performance and engagement endows humanly meaningful shape upon sonic form.
Style is an emergence, the means by which newly creative knowledge is developed from playful, rote, or ordinary participatory experience. Feld And such an accomplishment of style is especially liberating for people who have little control over the cultural institutions and icons of their society.
Stuart Hall points to the importance of style in black music in distinction to repertoire , arguing that: Within the black repertoire, style …has become itself the subject of what is going on. And mark how, displaced from a logocentric world…the people of the black diaspora have found the deep form , the deep structure of their cultural life in music. Salsa incorporated this stuff of everyday barrio life, la cosa cotidiana.
In salsa we heard our rumba [4] , our plena, our bomba, our seis, our son, our guaracha, our cumbia, our gaita, our daily problems of love and social life, as well as the joy and fun of living. This was heard all over the world and it was our stuff, with our music, with our dancing. When salsa took front stage, scores of Puerto Ricans and Latinos everywhere recognized ourselves in its sound, its style.
In this same vein, without going into the many apocryphal legends about who was first to use the term, DJs, bandleaders, and musicians started yelling "Salsa" as they were introducing a particularly energetic musical act or to spur the dancers and musicians on to more frenetic activity. So, much in the same way that Celia Cruz would shout, " Azucar ," meaning "sugar," to spur on the crowd in her way, the word "Salsa " was invoked to spice up the music and dancing.
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Select basic ads. Create a personalised ads profile. Select personalised ads. Apply market research to generate audience insights. Measure content performance. Develop and improve products. List of Partners vendors. By Tijana Ilich. Cuban-style salsa, also known as Casino, is popular in many places around the world, including in Europe, Latin America, North America, and even in some countries in the Middle East.
Dancing Casino is an expression of popular social culture; Latin Americans consider casino as part of social and cultural activities centering around their popular music.
The origins of the name Casino are derived from the Spanish term for the dance halls where a lot of social Salsa dancing was done in Cuba during the midth century and onward. In order to speak of the antecedents of the Rueda de Casino it is necessary to go back to the reign of Luis XIV in France where the first ballets appeared.
In order to have a good title it was necessary to know certain choreographies that were performed in the celebrations of the nobility. Clear examples: the Minuet and the Contradanzas. In the XVIII century, with the presence of French fleets in the bay of Havana, the arrival of emigrants of Louisiana, New Orleans and fundamentally the French emigration coming from Haiti with the revolution produced the appearance in Cuba of the French Contradanzas and derived from this the Cuban Contradanza arises.
The court of Luis XIV, the Creole aristocracy, Spanish and including the town interpreted the dance with pre-planned figures that all had to know and directed by a bastonero. There have been contradiction between the informants of the place where casino fist appeared. Some say that it first appeared in the Spanish Casino, Grammar school of Havana, the Patricio Lumumba and others say in the Sport Casino; what is true is that it expanded throughout the capital.
In the s many great dancers gathered there for friendly competitions. They would practice all week to invent new moves and go to the club to show them off. Sooner or later they began to dance the moves together. In order to keep a distinction between one move and another, they began naming them and Rueda de Casino was born.
As a result of the Castro regime, many Cubans immigrated to the US, a large portion of which to the Miami area. With them they took their culture including various foods, music and dancing. Rueda de Casino began to slowly make its way into the Miami salsa community and in the late s and early s it experienced an enormous explosion of popularity. There it has been so embraced, that one is hard-pressed to find a nightclub in which Casino or Rueda is not danced.
This festive dance, which was brought to Miami by Cuban immigrants, took hold there in the ls and ls. From Miami, it spread first to major U. Salsa Casino has evolved in Miami to such an extent that a new and distinctly different style has emerged. Miami style. It is a type of salsa dancing done by a group in a circle, with partners being passed around. This wildly popular dance was done everywhere in Cuba—in the streets, in parking lots, in clubs, in homes.
The moves to this dance are numerous and can be very complex. The dance is done by two or more couples who do the moves in synchrony. A member of the circle calls the moves for everyone to execute. Each move has a name and most have hand signals since it is hard to hear in noisy nightclubs.
Moves can be called in quick succession, and along with frequent partner exchanges, this creates a very dynamic and exciting atmosphere for everyone involved. The group nature of the dance is unique and makes it quite social. A group consciousness develops to make the rueda work well—with everyone watching the leader for the calls.
Dancers have to open up their sphere of awareness far beyond what is necessary for ordinary partner dancing. Whether you are dancing or watching, it is thrilling when a rueda circle works well and flows smoothly!! Rueda can be done to any salsa music. It is best danced to music with a driving beat and no rhythm breaks. Latin music often changes rhythm throughout one song, unlike American music. Note that salsa dancers can step on beats 1, 2 and 3 or on beats 2, 3, and 4.
Most Cubans dance on two, and some American dancers prefer the more relaxed feeling that dancing on two creates. However, some dancers prefer to dance on one since that is more consistent with an American approach to music, and the first beat is easier to find. Dancing on two is a little more musically difficult. Rueda in this country is generally danced on one. To the reader, this difference—which beat the dance pattern starts on—may seem like a small matter.
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