Some of San Diego’s finest dance companies will be coming together for the San Diego salsa and bachata Dia de San Juan Puerto Rican Festival this Saturday June 12.  The performers and dance companies include Abel Pena, Susie Nguyen & Ooh La La Dance Company, Alma Latina, Salsa Inferno, and the recently returned Deseo Dance under Serena Cuevas‘ direction.

The event runs from noon to 6pm so you’ll still have plenty of time to go dancing at night too!

For more information on the event and to see ticket information check out RSVP on the San Diego Salsa and Latin Dancing Meetup Group.

See you all this Saturday!

John ;-)

@Ritmo Bello

At first glance you probably wouldn’t think that San Diego has much going on apart from the traditional surfing and other recreational diversions for which this place is known. It takes a simple look under that well known surface to see that San Diego is a teeming hot bed of salsa dance talent.

Much of that dance talent is due in part to the myriad of salsa dance competition teams that offer a wide array of styles and philosophies of salsa dance. San Diego is fortunate to have a salsa scene influenced by such a great group of performers that help inspire those new to the scene to learn more about the dance.  Here at Ritmo Bello I’ve been privileged to get to know these performance groups over the years and I wanted to highlight some of them here.

Well known performance groups like Majesty in Motion and dancers from A Time To Dance Studio have excited audiences through the years through innovative dance. Newer dance companies such as Alma Latina and Salsa Susie’s Cosabellas & Hot Tamales have done a great job of expanding salsa dancing to a wider group of people. Some local San Diego talent has seen great national exposure such as Junior & Emily’s Amicitia Dance Company and Serena Cuevas Deseo Dance.

These and many other dance teams which I haven’t mentioned here all deserve to be recognized for the great exposure they give salsa dancing to the general public. For many people here in San Diego, joining a dance team is a great way to accelerate your learning of salsa dance while expressing yourself through performance.

If you’ve had a good experience with a local San Diego dance team feel free to leave a comment on this post.

John ;-)

Ritmo Bello

San Diego is blessed to have lots of salsa talent.  Many people don’t realize, though, that San Diego’s location close to the border of Mexico means that some of that talent is influenced by dancers from Mexico.

Case in point is salsa dance troupe Alma Latina.  Based out of Tijuana and led by salsa champions Gabriela Equiz & Sergio Jasso, the group is comprised of dancers from both the United States and Mexico.  Alma Latina was recently highlighted in an article that appeared in the Union Tribune and mentions their efforts at qualifying for the next World Salsa Championships.  The video in this article above shows a small glimpse of the dance teams expertise.

As with many dance troupes in San Diego, Alma Latina’s members have roots that connect them with Majesty in Motion’s dance team (you can check out the interview I did of them in this past Ritmo Bello article).  

Both teams and many other dance troupes in San Diego will be working hard to compete in the next Salsa World Championships (originally set for December but postponed for now).  For now make sure to show your support for Alma Latina and all the other local dance teams that bring the spotlight to San Diego.