The Latin Dances

These are hard to pin point but easy for Latin Americans. They are the dances that originated with the inhabitants of the Americas before the arrival of the first illegal aliens. Most of the modifications were made in the 1500s and 1600s mostly from Spanish influence, but also from the French, Germans and Italians and a century of so later by the freed slaves.

Musical and Dance compositions no longer inhabit certain countries, certain museums,

like paintings and statues. My Latin music and dance is on my computer."

We have two somewhat strict disciplines (they make rules) of Latin Ballroom Dance. The American, - Bolero, Cha Cha Cha, East Coast Swing, Mambo and Rumba. The British, which has been renamed as the International, - Cha Cha Cha  Jive,  Paso Doble,  Rumba and Samba. Each of these dances is performed to the prescribed music and tempi by couples demonstrating not only proper technique but also poise, power, floor craft and other criteria that reflect the quality of their dancing according the discipline.

"Moliendo Cafe" por Azucar Moreno

So to establish our social Latin Rhythm dances we must eliminate some and it leaves us with, Cha Cha, Cha, Mambo, Rumba and Samba. We must add, (what in the present are the peripherals,) the Bachata, Salsa and the Argentine Tango. Seven dances is a good beginning but it will not be engraved on stone. The Latin Waltz? With a Rock Step and a Chassé. The Latin style dancers will make the ultimate decisions and they will be made at the new Latin night club.

“Social dancers say that with dance there are no real explanations.

You just have to experience it."

Not Much

This blog is not doing so good this year. Same viewpoint as before, trying to get some information about the Night Club scene for our Night Clubbing readers. Just not getting it. Most of the people I come in contact with are not very aware of the potential in a blog. They don't know much about web sites either but they believe that any organization that has a web site, has arrived. Patience, the readers will eventually find out the use of each to share the dance information with our fellow dancers.

“Social dancers know that art doesn’t give rise to anything in us that isn’t already there.

To find pleasure in moving to music is in all of us."

The largest Night Clubs with the most fans have beautiful web sites. They are making money hand over fist. They feel that they do not need a blog site too. No hu hu, they should do as they please. However there are some out there that are thinking blog site. But blog site for one dance organization will not get you enough readers to get out of the single digit average per day hit. It must be a multi-faceted blog such as the ones we have on Oahu.

"Fly Me To The Moon" by Jimmy Borges

And thanks  to Maile, she sent this Email in JPEG format, just copy and paste.

Since social dancing is one of my hobbies, it has a prominent place in all our blogs. A good start for any night club that does not have a web site would be to contribute dance information to share with the reader/dancers. For now the beacon for expansion and promotion is in West Oahu. At the moment led by Dot's in Wahiawa and Just Tacos in Mililani. There is one coming up in Waikele or Waipio, but may just be rumors. Fortunately, the Wahiawa Ballroom Dance Club has the best influence on dancing in this entire section.

"Our blogosphere is changing, the only difference between

a rut and a grave is their dimensions."

The Bottom Blogs

Dancing Nights blog alternating with Latin Rhythms at the bottom of the pile in average hits per day. The difference will be in the feedback, the opinions of the reader/dancers which are the important things in a dance blog. Comments, emailed items, photos and anything that can be shared with our fellow dancers. A blog is a something like a website, except that it is frequently updated and the contents are posted in Chronological order and are presented to the visitors in reverse Chronological order.

"Social dancers know that music is the most abstract of the arts and dance,

the most concrete. Together they make our world.”

If we must define what a blog is now, in 2018, we could say that blogs are an early 21st-century version of the public town square. Humans have always had a need for social contact and for information and on Oahu our dance blogs can provide a platform for both. Dancing Nights had been set up to cover the Night Club scene but I cannot get around much anymore so we must have help. Anybody out there that can share a little night club information. Email and I will post.

"Fly Me To The Moon" by Jimmy Borges

In Honolulu most dance groups have web sites and are making money hand over fist. So we can understand their lack of interest in blogging. However there may be some out there that could use a little extra information sharing with the reader/dancers of this blog. You may email one sentence to start and see how it looks in print. You can then increase it as you wish. Right now, the expansion is going to the Waianae Coast and to the North Shore.

Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, you'll find one at the end of your arm.

As you grow older you will discover that you have two hands.

One for helping yourself, the other for helping others."

Night Clubbing on Oahu

By Roy Ching, Pupukea

Okay, you probably already know that Fridays and Saturdays are the busy nights for a nightclub on Oahu. In fact, their busiest time – the time most people are in the club – is between 10 p.m. and 2 a.m. The club may open at 8 p.m. but not many folks will visit at that time. If you’re anxious your first time out, I suggest visiting during the early hours – when the club is less likely to be crowded. How you should dress will depend on the nightclub you’re going to.

"You don’t dance? You were a dancer once upon a time.

You just stopped and you don’t remember when."

If it’s a typical club, casual party dress is fashionable, just clothes that’ll fit you well. And, if the weather is cold, consider handing your jacket the cloakroom worker if they have one. Most nightclubs require visitors to pay a cover charge to get into the nightclub. You’re also likely to be stamped on the arm or be given a bracelet, so if you go out at any time, you can gain entrance again without paying once more. When you go to a nightclub for the first time, you’re going to be in an unfamiliar situation.

"With A Song In My Heart" by Frank Sinatra 

If you want to adapt quickly, consider learning where the bar is as soon as possible so that you can get your drinking on. Stand by the bar, sipping your drink to observe everything around you. Keep in mind that you’ll pay more for your drinks – as they’re usually up to three times higher than what you’d pay outside the club. So, bring some additional cash with you. Depending on the club size, it may have a size to match dance floor. If you start to feel anxious, start walking around. Strike up a conversation with people who are near you.

Tiny Bubbles" by Don Ho

And if it is dancing you want you can enjoy visiting many places just to "case the joints." You will find plenty of nice places with plenty of nice people. Then you can take your choice. I would like a nice place on the North Shore. Those  that live in Kapolei would prefer other locations. Makaha?

Salsa

By Rueben Gutierrez, Waipio

The modern Salsa dance from New York was popularized in the 70s by Eddie Torres and his contemporaries who were 1st or 2nd generation Puerto Rican immigrants. This style is not danced to Mambo music, for which it is poorly suited, but instead to Salsa music. Mambo is still danced for fun and the joy of moving to Mambo music. As a fad dance it has been in effect for over half a century. But then came Salsa, but it too may be a fad dance? Bachata?

"Poetry and music exist in time. Painting and architecture are a part of space.
But only the dance lives at once in both space and time."

Another 10 years perhaps. Ten years ago Reggaeton began to attract young Hispanic Americans who might otherwise have gravitated to Latin music. It was destined to replace Salsa but it too seems to have fizzled out in a very short period. And there have been others that did not make it far. At the same time ballroom aficionados began to embrace Salsa as a serious dance form, which further alienated the young club goers. And now we have Kizomba and Zouk coming in.

Today Salsa is kept alive by an ardent band of Professional and Semi-Professional dancers, not only in New York but around the world. It has been said that Salsa has gotten bigger in the sense that more people are taking lessons but the people who came up in the streets and know about the music are not dancing it. Even in the 90s, you could go out every night in New York and have four or five places to choose from, and all of them had live music, and you don't find that anymore, especially in the Bronx, which used to be known as "el barrio de la Salsa."

“For most Social Dancers, there is no likelihood that they would make a living from dance.

They do it because they love it. They realize how full they feel when

they are surrounded by music and dancing and joy.”

Nic Nacs

Something To Keep

A smile costs nothing, but gives much. It enriches those who receive, without making poorer those who give. It takes but a moment but the memory of it sometimes lasts forever. No one is so rich and mighty that they can get along without it, and no one is so poor that they cannot be made rich by it.

A smile creates happiness in the home, fosters good will in business, and is a countersign for friendship. It brings rest to the weary, cheer to the discouraged, sunshine to the sad, and is nature's best antidote to trouble.

Yet it cannot be bought, begged, borrowed or stolen until it is given away. Some people are too tired to give you a smile. So give them one of yours, as no one needs a smile so much as those who have none to give.

Meanwhile, the young Latin Scene is evolving. The slow down of the Salsa is definitely here at the beginning of 2018. And most dancers are aware of Bachata and the fact that we have some of the best Salsa music in the Pacific right here on Oahu, live and DJ. So we must help all our friends in the Salsa scene. Perhaps a revival will take hold.

If you remember, Labada lasted less than ten years and Reggaeton came and went in less than three. the dance instructors made millions of dollars. Mambo had that magic at one time but it too is lost now. We must expand our coverage of Salsa. Meanwhile, we must include Bachata, for it is coming up fast. Kizomba and Zouk are coming in slowly but the more experienced Latin dancers will still go for the dances that have been there from the old Latin scene.

"Let us read and let us dance - two amusements that will never do any harm to the world."

~ Voltaire

Night Clubbers

We can all take pictures but not everyone can capture the beauty that's usually hidden

in plain view - We can all open our mouths to sing but not everyone can melodically

touch your soul - We can all pick up a pen to write but not everyone can write

words in such a way that they leap off of the page for you.

We can all part our lips to speak but not everyone can speak life into you -

We can all move our bodies to a beat but not everyone can become

one with music, stir emotions and shift energy with dance.

The point is that none of us is perfect but we can all do something. And we are all unique,

with unique views. Just know your gifts, cultivate them, perhaps share them in a blog

and always try to be yourself. Then working together becomes effortless.

Copies aren't accepted everywhere - ORIGINALS are eventually required!

In 2001, Democratic President Clinton handed Republican George Bush a projected 10-year budget surplus over $5 trillion. Bush and Cheney turned Clinton's surplus into a $5 trillion deficit through outrageous tax cuts for the rich, two disastrous wars, and a financial crash that caused the Great Recession. It took us over ten years to get out of that mess. And the Republicans were able to buy the presidency for the jerk of the century. Yeah man!

"Cheerfulness is what greases the axles of the world.
Don't go through life creaking."

We don't have lawyers like these in Hawaii

 
A man walks into a lawyer's office and asks the lawyer what his rates are.

 "I charge $100 for 3 questions."

"That's rather expensive for only 3 questions, isn't it?" asks the guy.

"Yes it is. And your final question?"

Rumba

By Francisco Parodi, Wailuku, Maui

Rumba dates back to over 600 years. Many years before the arrival of the first illegal aliens. Of course it was not exactly the same thing and danced a little different according to the different islands in the Caribbean. With the advent of bolero, it slowed somewhat and evolved into the Son and Danzon and others similar dances. Gradually, as more people mingled from one island to another, it took on the name Rumba in the cities. The sailors that went up and down the Caribbean were the ones that standardized it even thought is was a solo dance.

"Social dancers know that opportunity may knock, but you gotta open the door."

Prior to the Second World War. what was exported was really the local Rumbas slowed down by the Bolero and reprocessed by the American and British dance teachers. The fast Mambo-Rumba went back to the sticks and reemerged after the WWII and was introduced as Mambo by Perez Prado in Mexico City. However in Cuba, Mexico City, and New York it was completely different to the modern dance that New Yorkers eventually call "Mambo." The original Rumba dance contains mostly basic steps and not easily accepted by many professional dance teachers.

Cuban dancers would describe mambo as "feeling the music" in which sound and movement were merged through the body. They went for the even step, the rock step and occasional chasse. But they could go forward, backward, side ways, turn left, turn right and all the time changing the movement of the leg, hip, upper torso, arms and heads. Professional dance teachers in the US saw this approach to dancing (naturally) as "extreme," "undisciplined," and thus, they saw it necessary to standardize the dance to present it as a sell-able commodity for the social or ballroom market. What Rumba is danced in the modern Oahu night club?

"Social dancers believe that to be happy, they must be concerned about others."