Learning to dance

I had my first dancing experience in San Franciso in 2018, I went with a friend to Space 550, a latin night club where I had an intro class to salsa. I didn’t enjoy it that much because I was new to it and because you have to be a good leader (or at least a leader with enough decent moves) to start enjoying it.

I decided to try again in late 2021 at a dance academy in South San Jose called Dance Boulevard. They had a 90$ all-you-can-dance 1-month package where I got to try different types of dance including salsa, bachata and ballroom. I went to all the classes and initially I focused on getting better at salsa, over the next weeks I realized that bachata was more fun not only to dance to but to listen to. The salsa and bachata counts are similar (1 to 8), I felt that salsa was faster and more fluid while bachata is more relaxed and you can slow down on steps 4 and 8, over the next months I spent listening to bachata music way more and I started enjoying the music too, it’s just very very fun.

While I could keep on dancing both I decided I’d stick to bachata for the long run.

Dancing bachata is perfect for me because:

  • First and foremost, it’s fun.
  • It’s a way to do cardio and improves my fitness.
  • It’s a great way to make friends and connections with people that like bachata as much as you do.
  • (bonus) It’s a perfect excuse to travel. My excuse are the dance festivals happening all around the world.

My bachata journey

How do you get better at it?

The steps to get better are simple, you go to group classes and learn a few moves, if there are dance socials right after the class you stay and practice the moves you learned. Then at home you practice on your own, I focus a lot on perfecting isolations (targeted movement of a part of my body) so that the follower can feel the next move I’d like to do. Finally, you go to the social dance nights every week to apply what you learned in classes and on your own.

I liked going to bachata festivals to learn new moves, on my first festivals I went to most of the classes over the 3 days I was there. Looking back, there are too many moves to learn and I felt drained to go to the social dance nights by the end of the day. For future festivals, I decided to pick a few classes that matched my style (I like sensual bachata) and the rest of the time I’d spend it exploring the town. Then later, I’d go back to the hotel, rest and go to the social dance night which usually start very late after midnight.

Nowadays, I spend my free time at home practicing a small set of moves and some variations, as I mentioned before I also practice isolations a lot. My teacher says that we should dominate the fundamentals and that’s exactly what I focus at home over and over again.

In the dance floor there are good days and bad days. Days where you feel the flow of the music and all the moves click in your head and days where you don’t feel the flow of the music at all. Days where you dance with a follower and all of the moves and their transitions seem so effortless and days where you can’t make a connection with a follower and the moves don’t go with the flow.

It’s a life long hobby, so let’s just enjoy the process.

2021 - Starting my dancing journey

  • I started dancing bachata in late 2021 at a dance academy in South San Jose called Dance Boulevard.
  • I went a couple of times to Alberto’s Night Club, a dance night club in Mountain View. I didn’t enjoy it much because I was still a beginner and because the dancing space was very small.
  • On a few Saturday nights I went to Space 550 in San Francisco, this is where I met a dance instructor called Kathy Reyes who became my first bachata teacher.

2022 - The year of the bachata festivals

  • On weekday nights I went to Berkeley to dance with Kathy Reyes, she liked traditional bachata so I got to learn lots of footsteps, every week we’d learn a new combo and practice in a mini social night event afterwards.
  • On weekday nights I went to Studio M in San Jose to dance with Ngoc Huynh who was my 2nd bachata teacher, I met her in a Sunday social dance event in San Francisco, I really like her energy and humor, she’s a great teacher as well.
  • On saturdays I went to the socials in Space 550 in San Francisco.
  • I learned about bachata festivals happening all around the US, they were a perfect excuse to start travelling more and to explore the US. The festivals are usually 4 day long events where multiple bachata professional teachers teach you new combos in the afternoon and there are huge social dance events at night. Initially I went to the classes to learn new combos but there are too many classes and too many moves to learn that I felt that I was not learning the right way because it was just too much content. I decided I’d go to a few classes and instead spend my time exploring the city where the festivals took place.
    • Bachata Festival in LA in May.
    • Bachata Festival in Sacramento in June.
    • Bachata social nights in San Diego in July.
    • Bachata Festival in San Francisco in July.
    • Bachata Festival in Miami in September.
    • Bachata social nights in New York in October.
  • In the July festival in San Francisco, I met ataca and la alemana, they’re a very famous bachata duo characterized by their romantic dance style, every time they dance they show a strong dance connection, they do simple moves but with great transitions.

  • I danced with la alemana in the festival! Fun souvenir, a photo with ataca y la alemana:

    Yo y Ataca y la Alemana

  • I went to a bachata concert by Prince Royce in San Jose in October.

  • I created a bachata player website to mark my love for bachata.

2023 - Slow year in bachata dance

  • I stopped dancing in March because of an upcoming move.
  • I moved to NYC in mid 2023.
  • I started dancing again in September at KS Bachata Sensual NYC with Steven Halim and Kasia Brozynska, in their teaching style they have a 4-week cycle class where you learn a combo and perfect it during the cycle, this style is my favorite because I get to perfect a combo and just replay it in the dance floor.
    • They also host social night events on Saturday nights, I didn’t go to them as much as I wanted.
  • I went to a bachata concert by Romeo Santos in New Jersey in November.

2024 - Making covers of bachata songs

One of the reasons I moved to the city is to be more involved in the music scene as a performer, I like playing the guitar in my free time so I decided I’d start making covers of bachata songs that I like, I started going to a few voice lesson classes to improve my singing skills for the open mic events. I also started a Youtube channel where I upload my covers.

  • I watched Aventura in the Madison Square Garden in May.
  • From June to Nov I kept on going to KS Bachata Sensual NYC classes on weekdays. I didn’t go to socials on Saturdays as often which is not good!
  • I did my first bachata cover and uploaded to Youtube, I made a cover of Solo Conmigo by Romeo Santos.

My Favorites

This is a collection of my favorite steps in Bachata or the steps that I do in the dance floor. I look at these clips regularly while practicing and I try them in the dance floor.

Dancers

Combos

I learned a lot from reels from this channel https://www.instagram.com/bachataworldmasters/.

Video Why I like it
https://www.instagram.com/p/CsJi6wVNfpG/ The transition to two types of waves, the arm wave at the end.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CjsSijqjXOq/ Simple but easy to do
https://www.instagram.com/p/CqNZ_uwjX59/ Leader switch front and back
https://www.instagram.com/p/CgwROATvrSY/ Simple variation on diagonal (ataca y la alemana)
https://www.instagram.com/p/CgjHS_dA_D7/ Hip out, Chest out, Chest in, Hip in
https://www.instagram.com/p/DCRLfdyCIR8/ Titanic step
https://www.instagram.com/p/Cqk7EsoOyk5/ Contra y circulo (tutorial)
https://www.instagram.com/p/CttvRi-smnq/ Leader switch front and back + a very nice hair brush at the end
https://www.instagram.com/p/CsjZBrIvZWq/ Double turn lead, follower shadow, nice sync jump with the music
https://www.instagram.com/p/CuHh2JvgFwR/ Basic of basic turn with hug + hip,chest,chest,hip
https://www.instagram.com/p/CuMbAybAvIH/ Perfect intro to the chorus
https://www.instagram.com/p/CuMsbw1LeJX/ Onda lateral + contra
https://www.instagram.com/p/C1e224nCSVi/ Lady squat
https://www.instagram.com/p/C12LBKti8tf/ Side plank
https://www.instagram.com/p/C48DmHGiyFi/ Nice double turn + hair brush