Workshop Fun

Congresses are also about workshops - what new things to learn and try in salsa. And the Canada Salsa Congress had workshops! If dancing until 4:00am. wasn't enough, the workshops started at 11:00am. - barely enough time to sleep - and finished at 5:00pm. Each workshop crammed into one hour what would be covered in a 6 week session of lessons. Be prepared to drag that foggy brain and achy body through some challenging work!

Thespina noted, "The workshops were great, I only wish I could have taken more! I hated having to choose one over another for the most part. I think in the future, I'll take fewer, actually, and practice what I learned during the hour after the workshop, unless there's another one I really want to take. I found that cramming too much in almost made them a little less valuable, because I couldn't take it all in. I started to run out of juice. Red Bull next time?

" The week-end mantra, "Five, Six, Seven... again... One, Two, Three, Five, Six, Seven..." echoed from every workshop room as people walked, danced, floated or struggled through turn patterns and moves that could defy the imagination.

Al "Liquid Silver" Espinoza ran a great beginner's workshop that took basic moves and gave them that special wow factor. Al started by ging permission, "Dont be afraid to be a Beginner!"

"We'll show you how to look above your level." Al continued, flashing a disarming smile that drew them into his web.

Al focussed one a point often overlooked by many instructors. Setting up the follower for a turn. "Leaders, draw a happyface with your follower's right arm,starting on the one so the arm up by three."

He wanted the leaders to prepare and let the followers know a turn was coming, rather than jerk the arm up on five and horse them through by surprise.

Super Mario challenged the intermediate and the master dancers with just a few of his million moves and his very dry challenging wit. "Confused? Good!"

To the ladies, he offered an instant solution to that perennial challenge, "Problems with the lead? change the guy!"

Super Mario tempted them by effortlessly gliding through patterns that mere mortals would take weeks to learn. "Come on, you're Masters!" he prodded. And some rose to the occasion, picking up and running through them.

They knew they were in for a run for their money when Super Mario told the DJ, "Play the fastest one you've got, Number 13!" A blur of feet and arms and bodies flew to the beat, with smiles coming from the ones who got it!

The newest workshop, from the birth place of Reggaeton, Puerto Rico, The Young Blood's Reggateon drew hundreds. A large block of dancers was moving the feet to something between salsa and Hip Hop, finishing the hour with a huge circle of dancers cheering on the daring ones in the center who were getting it down, waay down! Watch for some very creative Reggaeton coming soon to a dance floor near you.

The trick to most of workshops is knowing enough of the basic moves and turns that are assembled into turn patterns being taught. Even the beginners need to know hook turns, left hand or reverse turns, cross body leads with turn, stepping side to side and not simply forward and back in mambo. Only then could the pattern being taught be picked up with relative ease. The effort would be spent learning the new combination, not learning the moves and the new pattern all at once!