Questions and Answers

This post is for questions that I have answered. Feel free to email questions to me (related to my blog), and I will do my best to quickly give you an answer (or be honest if I don't know and have no way of finding out!).

To reiterate the point of my blog... I created this blog to share what I have learnt from percussion - and how this has helped me with my salsa. I am not an expert, but am here to help!

Question: Dancing on the Clave

I'm an avid Casino style salsa dancer and needed some further explanation as to which feet strike the ground on which hit of the clave. I dance on1. Assuming the clave is a 2/3, does the counting go like this... 1,2 [pause] 3,4,5. Salsadynasty.com has some good instructional videos where they dance only to the clave rhythm and I appreciate the simplicity.

My thoughts:

In terms of footwork and the clave, it's actually a very easy formula, regardless of whether you dance a Cuban style (Casino for example) or a more linear style (LA, for example).

For a 2/3 clave, if you are dancing on one or on two, your feet and clave will always come together on the two, the three and the five (of an eight beat basic - i.e. two bars of 4/4 time). This is regardless of whether you go forward or backwards as a lead in the first bar. Easy huh? :)

For a 2/3 clave, if you are going forward on one or backwards on two, the feet to "hit the clave" will be your right foot, then your left, then your right again. The final two strikes of the clave (six and half, then eight of a full basic) will not match up with your footwork (although they will come close). If you are going backwards on one or forward on two, the feet to hit the clave will be your left foot, then your right, then your left again.

For a 3/2 clave, it is just a simple. Your feet will hit on the one, the six and the seven. If you are going forward on one or backwards on two, the feet to "hit the clave" will be your left foot, your left again, then your right. The middle two strikes of the clave (two and half, and four) will not match up with your footwork. If you are going backwards on one or forward on two, the feet to hit the clave will swap (it will now be your right foot, your right foot again, then your left).

I love focusing on the clave when dancing. The two times I do this the most are for slow songs (the clave is more obvious due to less crowding of the music), and when dancing on the two (where I am focusing on the percussion more so than the lyrics or melody). Accentuating the clave when dancing to slow songs makes you feel (and look) like you are "in the dance" more, whereas if you just step out each beat, it feels and looks far too "mechanical" (a great guy by the name of Gino GianCarlos Mayaute showed me this).

As for dancing purely on the clave, I have never seen this done (I only go as far as to accentuate the footwork which lands on the clave). I have, however, seen leaders lead moves (with their upper body) in time with the clave, for example they will delay a hand flick or a turn until the next clave beat (so they are technically "out of time" by half a beat or so), or perhaps they will spin a girl multiple times, but in time with the clave instead of exactly every second beat. When done well, that looks really cool!