Learn

Learn to hear salsa

Short guides to hearing the music and finding the 1: how the count works, what the clave does, what each instrument plays and how to practise without a partner. Whatever can be measured in SalsaCoach’s band is measured; everything else cites a source.

Timing and counting

Timing

How to find the 1 in salsa music

What to listen for, which cues hold up from song to song, and why the clave is a hard first cue.

Timing

How to count salsa music

The 8-count, the pauses on 4 and 8, and how fast salsa really is.

The music

What the clave tells you (and what it doesn’t)

2-3, 3-2, and why the pattern everything is built on is a hard first cue.

The music

Salsa instruments and what they play

The bell, congas, bass, timbales, bongó, piano and güiro, and which ones help you find the beat.

The dance

On1 vs On2: the difference, counted out

Same music, different break. Both On2 counts, where they came from, and which one SalsaCoach scores.

Practice

How to practise salsa timing on your own

A routine you can do alone, what “early” and “late” mean in milliseconds, and why tapping early is normal.

History and artists

History

Where salsa came from: a map, not a birthplace

Cuban son, Puerto Rican bomba and plena, and New York in the 1960s and 70s. Who made what, with dates.

History

What Fania Records changed

The label that sold New York’s Latin dance music to the world as “salsa”, and the arguments it left behind.

Artists

Héctor Lavoe: what a dancer can listen for

El Cantante de los Cantantes: the voice of Willie Colón’s band, the Fania solo years, and how to hear his songs as a dancer.

Coming next: the artists (Héctor Lavoe, Ismael Miranda, Frankie Ruiz), the history of On2, Cali and the scene today.