Salsa Dancing : Alternatives to the Basic Step

By now, you should have practiced the Salsa basic step enough so that you feel comfortable with the count, step, and lead/follow. In this lesson, I want to spice things up a bit by discussing a few extra ingredients you can throw into your Salsa...alternatives to the Salsa basic step.

One alternative to the Salsa basic step is what I will call a 'break'. This step involves an opening of the space between partners on counts 1 and 5, and is a back-back step instead of a forward-back (leader) or back-forward (follower.) Basically, the leader initiates this step by stepping back with his left foot on count 1 instead of forward. He also releases his partner's hand. Depending on what he is looking for, this back step can be a short step back, as the basic step in Cali, Colombia tends to be, or it can be a complete opening of the space between the two partners, with the end result being that both are nearly side by side.