Re-print, with permission from Reuters - 6/14/99 -

Swing May Be Swung as 'Salsaholics' Take Hold
10.53 a.m. ET (1453 GMT) June 14, 1999
By Jill Serjeant

LOS ANGELES — You know you are addicted to Salsa when you would rather dance all night than have sex.  In Cuba they have been doing it for almost a century, in New York it took off in the 1950s. Now Salsa is spicing up dance floors and night clubs from Tokyo to Turkey in an explosion of hip-shaking, sultry Latin rhythms.  The sensuous couple dance that instantly turns strangers in the night into close friends has broken out of its Latino niche to become the hottest new dance to travel the world.  Popularized by movies like Dance With Me, Mambo Kings and Dirty Dancing, Salsa is whipping up a storm across Europe and Australia and has a huge following in such unlikely places as Japan and Germany.   "We plan to be like McDonald's — everywhere," Eddie Torres, the New York-born choreographer and teacher regarded as the king of modern Salsa, told Reuters in an interview at an international Salsa gathering in Los Angeles.   "It is because the music is so good. It is an infectious rhythm, it is happy. The dance is very spicy. It is a thing about two people. It is like the tango. It is very exhilarating, very passionate," Torres said.  Two years ago, 15 countries took part in the first World Salsa Congress in Puerto Rico, where modern Salsa evolved at the turn of the century from Cuba's "son" peasant music that also developed into the mambo music of 1950s New York. 

SALSA EVEN IN JORDAN   This year, organizers expect 60 countries to take part in the week-long extravaganza of Salsa workshops and performances in Puerto Rico. Similar events are taking place later this year in Italy, Mexico, India, Japan, Venezuela, Germany, the Netherlands, Canada, Turkey, Spain, France and Australia.  The first Salsa dance school in the Arab world opened in the Jordanian capital Amman in April 1998 and an Internet site (Salsaweb.com) keeps aficionados, known as salseros, up to date on the best clubs and classes in cities worldwide. 

Japan, with its reputation for cultural correctness and reserve, might seem one of the more unlikely nations to adopt a sensuous dance but Tokyo has seen a boom in Salsa nightclubs.  "The Japanese work very hard. They have a stressed, high pressure lifestyle and I think they have found this dance a recreation to release that stress," Torres said. "I see it for them as more like therapy."  George Watabe, in the music business in Japan for 30 years, said Salsa was brought over mostly by young Japanese women who returned after working stints in the United States. Japanese men are still shy about getting close to women on the dance floor, says Watabe, who brought a group of 15 Salsa dancers from Tokyo to the Los Angeles congress.  "Japanese students always dance according to the rules they are taught. They don't try to make any adventurous moves. But by taking them to other countries they will come to know how Salsa is spontaneous and free," he said.  

SUBSTITUTE FOR YOU-KNOW-WHAT?  As good a form of exercise as a session on a treadmill, and a lot more fun, Salsa is a big hit on the singles scene in Europe and the United States, but confessed "Salsaholics" say the joy of dance can all too easily replace the joy of sex.  A light-hearted Salsa handbook lists the three stages of addiction: 1) giving up TV; 2) convincing yourself you can get by on four hours sleep a night; 3) preferring Salsa to sex. 

It comes as no surprise to Torres, 49, who caught dancing fever at the age of 12 when he was rejected by a girl because he could not dance Latin. Regarded as the pioneer who took Salsa off the streets and onto the stage, he owes his success to legendary dance band leader Tito Puentes, whose music is the all-time favorite among Salsa dancers. "I used to dance my life away at night clubs in New York where Puentes used to play every week. He started me off with the vision of doing this more professionally," Torres said. He and his wife Maria began touring all over the world with Puente and in 1987 they set up their own dance company and studio.  Torres is credited with turning Salsa from a fast step sequence performed by men and women dancing separately into the hot, close couple dance that is creating such a stir. "That's how it started to really get popular," he said. "The guys see it and think 'If I learn how to dance it, I will get all these girls.' And the girls do the same thing."