Spotlight On Vallarta: Salsa Dance Champions Ignite the Floor at Quizas
 Roberta Rand - SF Productions
August 17, 2009
| | If you would like to learn how you can advertise your Banderas Bay area business on Spotlight on Vallarta, contact David Tarr in Puerto Vallarta at 044-322-133-0138, or call 1-877-824-1277 toll free from the US. | |
Mexicans love to dance. And on any given night along the Malecón, you can find every dance style from disco to banda, with dancers working up a sweat in silhouette against the strobe lights of the open-air clubs.
But last Saturday night at Quizas on the River Cuale - if you were lucky enough to get an invite - dance played out at a whole different level with Salsa Picante, a group of Mexico's best salsa dancers from Guadalajara, who shared the floor with a few hand picked salsa champions from around the world.
Spotlight on Vallarta captured the group at a one-night, invitation-only exhibition of salsa pyrotechnics that would likely render Dancing with the Stars wannabe's frozen in mid-"guapea." Dancers from as far away as Argentina burned the floor with moves that magazined at 160-220 beats-per-minute. Body rolls, shoulder shimmies, spins and rapid-fire footwork were the rule as 50 couples unpacked their best moves from 10:30 pm until 2 am.
Among this year's dancers were National Mexico Salsa Champion David Zepeda Ayala (a PV resident), Bethzy Zamorano and Gustavo Sabino from Guadalajara, and Lucho Geraldes from Argentina.
For those of you who may not know Salsa's origins, it's believed to have started in Cuba, with a dance style called "son." The term "salsa" was adopted in the 1970's. Types of salsa correspond with countries and regions - from Cuban "Casino" to "Ruedo de Miami" to "Salsa Filipina."
Generally speaking, in salsa dancing, the upper body remains level while the dancer shifts his or her weight from one hip to the other, creating the famous "figure-8" hip-roll. Early versions of Salsa included the Mambo and the Cha-Cha. The dance continues to evolve with plenty of room for improvisation.
The key instrument in a salsa band is the conga drum, which provides the core "clave" groove. Other instruments that round out salsa music are the tres guitar, maracas, timbales, güiro and cowbell.
 Roberta Rand is Public Relations Manager for SF Productions TV. She just relocated to Puerto Vallarta from Colorado Springs, Colo, with her dog, Bo. She's worked as a magazine editor, web editor, marketing copywriter, essayist and author, whose book Playing the Tuba at Midnight explored the quirks of living single. |
Vallarta Weddings
Vallarta Living | August 2009 
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