Hello everyone! I,myself, am not a rhythm dancer, but my teachers and friends are.

I always understood that rhythm cuban motion was danced on a bent leg and the you would straighten and settle your hip, but recently a very good rhythm dancer told someone I know that the "bend, straight, and settle" method is out-dated and over used and rhythm is now danced like international latin, on a straight leg.

As a latin and smooth dancer I don't know much about the rhythm cuban motion but this was pretty shocking to me as I had never heard it before. Am I just out of the loop or are you guys confused too? If anyone has anything to say please comment.

Bob Powers did a two day workshop in Vermont in July, and he said that there simply was not enough time to do the bent leg thing. He said you land on a leg, you push one hip out, you rotate the spine, and then you take another step. He had us practice it, and I must say it worked very well.

Jerry Blumenthal

Is he saying there is not enough time because the music tempo has been sped up? or are there other changes in the technique that have limited how much time there is to take a bent leg and straighten it?

If the technique was this way for decades, what else has changed to make it outdated other than international dancers coming into the rhythm arena?

I doubt that it had anything to do with a change in music tempos. He was not speaking only of Mambo or Salsa, but also of Rhumba.

And he was not saying you could not bend the leg, it was just that you should be getting to a hyperextension and rotation quickly. And if you did that by landing on a leg that was not bent, that was fine.

Jerry