Korea Carruseles

Vacila.....la....la..la....lalalalalalala

Some people say 'vacila'.  Some people say, 'vacilala'.  I don't know.  I do know that it's one of the very basic figures in casino style and doing rueda because the same foot patterns occur in many many other patterns even though it looks different because of what the arms are doing.

This is a good video to look at several times and remember later on. I do know that in Spanish it means 'check her out!'.

 

And don't forget!  If you're one of the newbies in the group.  Once you learn the very basics of moving and counting and connecting you really don't need to waste a lot of money on studio lessons.  lessons are nice but it's an endless pit you can pour money down til the cows come home and still never have any fun or feel confident that you can dance. 

Unless you just like the idea of high priced meet 'n greets where you get to hold people hands without asking, you can get all the patterns you'll ever need from lookinngon YouTube.  And for casino style, specifically by looking at this site..... www.salsajunkies.com . 

If you'll use it, this meetup group can be a tremendous asset.  I can promise you that the biggest problem dancers have (especailly men dancers) in learning to dance and perfecting their skills is that they don't have somebody to dance with.  Your Meetup group basically solves that problem. 

Done!  Gone!  No more!  But you gotta find the individuals within the group who think like that.  Not everybody does.  I do.

El dos.....an adaptable casino pattern

Here's the SalsaJunkie guy (that last post was from www.salsajunkies.com) again.  This time with "El Dos".  Typically casino rueda is taught in 6-9 levels in the schools in Miami and El Dos is probably usually in the 2d or 3rd level.  It's not really hard and could easily be one of the first patterns we learn here in Seoul.  It's also interesting because it's a move that's very easily done in simple partner dancing.  And I've found that the Korean girls have never seen it.  They're surprised when you do it.

Don't forget to look at his website, www.salsajunkies.com for probably the best series of step by step videos on casino patterns on the net.

Evelyn......good move for beginners

I even forget this guys name.  I know he's in Canada.  Toronto I think.  His videos were one of the first group of casino videos that I learned from and I think he's really an excellent teacher.  His videos are right on the money in clarity, quality and content.

This particular video is an easy but fun and good looking move for beginners.  It's called Evelyn.  If you click through to his site, you'll see all the other videos he's done.  He doesn't seem to have put a lot of money into his online presence though.

Good German resource for videos

Here's a guy, a German, who executes very well.  His videos are well filmed except that the video is not synchronized with the music.  Maybe that's my computer.  I don't know.......but it's always been that way even when i was back in the US.  Nevertheless, the videos are worth looking at.  The only thing that might confuse some dancers is his counting.  He starts on the '5' (what I call the "B" part of the count).

Once you look at this one, notice that he has lots of other videos on YouTube too.  If you're interested in casino rueda you should subscribe to his channel.

 

Note:  I'm still looking for some basic videos.....for the Salsa Seoul Meetup group.  There are already some on here if you look through previous posts.

Hand signal video.....

This is one of the smartest videos I've ever seen done on casino rueda.  Something that really has needed to be done for a long time.  I think somebody could do a better and longer on too.

Lots of people learn some casino patterns but they don't learn the hand signals.  Hand signals are absolutely essential in a club due to the noise.  There's no way any one person can call more than a few ruedas in an evening.  It'll ruin his/her voice and it's physically very draining.  So hand signals are the only solution.

Of course, there's the secondary option of switching callers during the rueda.  Nothing wrong with that.  Anyway......here's the video. 

Cheesy but you can learn from it

It looks like I'm getting into the Meetup mode again.  Maybe third time's a charm, eh?  Anyway, Sara our illustriouos leader is interested in rueda and some of the other members have expressed an interest too.  That's what's got my attention.

So, as a learning aid to those dancers, I'm going to get back to publishing some videos I see on YouTube.  Here's the first.  It's a little cheesy but it's got some moves you can learn from.  My major functional complaint about it is that the guy doesn't give any hand signals and he's acts more like some Comedy Night characture of Desi Arnez.

Anyway.........here it is: