MEET THE SALSA FLEET TEAM

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Starting on the first Wednesday of each month, our 4-week Beginners Course provides a comprehensive introduction to all the fundamentals of dancing salsa including salsa rhythm, the basic steps and foundation partner work such as simple turns and the cross body lead. This is a fun and friendly course and no dance experience is necessary.

Feel free to visit our club and meet the SalsaFleet team or email us via this link and we will answer your query.

Times: Lessons start at 8pm. Doors open at 7.45pm for registration.
Note: After the class there is 10 minutes practice dancing before the improver and intermediate classes start. Beginners are very welcome to watch the next classes and remain at the venue for a drink – from 9.50pm there is freestyle practice dancing for all.

Cost: £24 per person

What you will learn:
Learning and understanding the basics is very important as everything else you learn in salsa will be built on top of these foundations. The basics include: Salsa timing, Basic salsa footwork forward & back, side to side, breaking back, single turns, basic salsa partnering, correct partner hold, correct arm tension, cross body lead.

Learning Time = 4 weeks. After the course has finished, you can either repeat the course to reinforce your learning or join our experienced beginners classes that also run at 8pm on a drop-in basis.

PLEASE BOOK IN ADVANCE TO SECURE YOUR SPACE

NO EXPERIENCE NECESSARY

BOOK ON YOUR OWN, WITH A PARTNER OR WITH FRIENDS!

GET FIT - MAKE NEW FRIENDS - GAIN CONFIDENCE - HAVE FUN!

Jim Costello (Director)

Jim has 12 years of salsa dancing experience, he has trained in Cuba, New York, and Spain, has been involved in several dance companies (Manhattan Mambo, Salsa Diva Dance Co.) and to broaden his understanding of dance has also trained in several other dance forms (Tap, Ballet, Contemporary, Tango). He has performed on Television and in 2002 he came third in the professional category of the Scalatina championships. In 2007 Jim formed Ignite Dance Company with fellow salsa dancers Giles and Rosa from Oxford. Their first choreography (Bendita) has been show cased at congresses and party nights across Europe and in the UK, and has been well received by promoters and salseros. Jim has a relaxed informal teaching style that takes note of the progression of the students, altering routines to suit the students level when required. The attention to detail with a touch of humour has made him popular teacher.

Jo Hutchinson (Teacher)

Jo is our new SalsaFleet Beginners teacher. She has been dancing salsa for several years now and has a background in ballroom Latin American dancing. In fact she is still competing in this field. Jo has great dance technique, posture and styling. Her background in ball room gives her salsa dancing a very elegant quality as she glides across the dance floor. Jo is fantastic to dance with and is great at improvisation. When she hears something in the music or I try a move that's very challenging she just goes with it, and never gets ruffled. You never notice any mistakes because she just makes it all seem like part of the dance.

Beata Smal (Class Assistant)

Beata Smal began her adventure with dance in 2004. She started by dancing in clubs in Warsaw, Poland where she first came across Salsa. In the following years she practiced other Latin - American dances such as Cha-Cha and Rumba. In 2009 she joined the club in Fleet. Beata has impressed everyone at SalsaFleet. She is very passionate about the dance, pays attention to every detail and has very good dance technique, she is also a pleasure to dance with, and is a very warm and endearing person. Beata can also dance 'The Waltz' and 'Tango'. At SalsaFleet Beata is a class assistant and helps myself and Jo with our classes, she is currently learning to dance as a leader so she will gain an understanding of every aspect of Salsa dancing

Ashley Fulham (DJ + Class Assistant)

Ashley is the youngest member of the SalsaFleet team. She's been dancing salsa since the age of 10 years old, when I would try my salsa routines on her. At this time she wasn't very enthusiastic, as anything Dad does just cannot be cool..... Ashley's role at SalsaFleet is to help out during the classes, meet, greet and take payments on the door & help with the DJing. She's a fantastic person and great fun to have around, she's also a very talented dancer and can follow just about any salsa move. Don't take my word on this, just ask the guys who take the classes!

SalsaFleet News letter July 2010

Hello Everyone,

Just a brief mail to outline whats going on this month(July) at SalsaFleet.

Cheers
Jim

Beginners Course/Classes
At this time of year its difficult for people to commit to a 4 week block of classes given its the holiday season, so for now the beginners classes will work the same way as the regular class i.e. on a drop in basis. It is better if you can do the whole course from start to finish as its structured this way and it works out cheaper, but at least you now have the choice to do either.

Bachata Party Night
We'll be having a Bachata party night at the end of this month. So its a change from our usual Rueda party night... All levels of class will be Bachata based so don't worry if you haven't danced it before.

Birthday NEWS....
Special thanks and congratulations to Julie. We celebrated her birthday last week, a great opportunity to mix and socialise and get to know every ones names. We have another birthday later this month... so reserve Wednesday 21st July for a traditional SalsaFleet birthday celebration. I'll leave the person unnamed at this time and only say that its a he. I'll provide the cake, You bring the nibbles ;-)


NEW Regular Classes (block booking scheme)
A couple of weeks ago someone asked me if they could pay for a block of four classes (because if they've already paid for the class, this would encourage them to get off the couch & go). this seemed a good idea to me... I get a guarantee of attendance and the money up front and the customer saves £1 pound on every class they attend. So, I'd like to extend this idea for everyone.

£24 for a block of 4 classes, which means if your a regular attender you save £4 over the block booking period.

NOTE: The four classes in a block booking can be taken at any time, there's no expiration date, they don't have to be taken in consecutive weeks (i.e. you can have your holiday or other break and you wont miss out out on any classes you've paid for. The only proviso I'll make is that the booking has to be for an individual (i.e. 4 people can't make a booking then use it all in the one night between them ;-)).


Credit where credit is due - Part1... (musings from Jim)
No body develops their own salsa style, movement, technique, turn patterns, shines etc without help and influence from other salsa dancers and teachers.

I always said that if I ever ran my own salsa venue, I would list the people who have influenced me the most in salsa. Just to give a little back to the people who have shaped the way I dance. Ultimately we are all individuals and we all move in our own unique way. Developing your own style, that you feel comfortable with, is part of the salsa learning experience. Maybe this re-cap of how my salsa dancing developed will influence you ;-)

Part1: Salsa Beginnings
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I started learning salsa in the late 90's at Bar Mambo in Guildford. Carlos Paz ran the venue and the advanced class was taught by William Dash. Everybody danced Cuban style salsa in those days and William was an incredibly smooth dancer. I loved the way the guy never looked rushed. He was great to watch and a nice guy too.

Then I went to Cuba with Kerry Ribchester. She introduced the idea of dancing from the heart, feeling the music, connecting with your partner and Afro-Cuban movement (something I still struggle with). Kerry's a fantastic person, great fun, and well respected in the salsa scene and beyond. She appeared on a TV program called 'Confidence lab' using music combined with afro-cuban body movement to help people regain confidence and improve their lives.

The next big thing on the salsa scene was 'Cross Body Lead' (XBL) style salsa. Imported from the USA, suddenly everybody was dancing lots of complicated moves. I attended various salsa classes Robert Charlamagne, Chandy David, Super Mario, Susanna Montero, but of all these XBL teachers Leon Rose had the biggest influence. I loved his classes because he not only danced this style superbly well, he also danced it with a huge amount of style and grace. A special mention to Super Mario here, as although I didn't attend many of his classes. The moves he taught, spread from his classes and everybody danced them. They didn't call him the 'million moves man' for nothing.

Enough ramblings from me, I'll add part 2. next month.....

Happy Salsering
Jim