A Personal Journey With The Guaguancó: Basic Step

Something I bear foremost in my mind when understanding rumba is the significance of the rooster in Afro-Cuban culture. More than just a key source of protein in the Sub-Sahara, belief has it that a five-toed chicken was instrumental in raising land from water in the creation of the world. Thus much of the guaguancó as a pursuit-and-capture dance involves movements symbolising that of a gallo (rooster) circling around a gallina (hen).

I use the whole-part-whole approach as much as I can when instructing myself; one of self-education's greatest weaknesses is lack of context, so I do everything that I can to protect what little that's there; to preserve the validity of the exercises.

Eyeballing the demonstration of the basic step on the DVD, I observe that:

1. it resembles (what I call) salsa's basic cucaracha step;
2. the dance rhythm is complementary to that of the African drumming cycle, being what Europeans would describe as on1;
3. the posture is a semi-inclined torso with softened knees;
4. initiation of the basic is with a physical preparative drop of the body's centre of gravity on the verbal cue of 'y' [ Spanish for 'and'], functioning like a musical 'pick-up';
5. foot placement is ball-flat, without rise, soft and deliberately percussive;
6. weight distribution on the side step is 50/50, that is, weight is not fully committed onto the stepping foot;
7. males: the head does not face the centre-line, but orients to the outward-stepping foot;
8. males: the contra hand (opposite to the outward-stepping foot) is held on to centre-line as a loose fist, acting as counterweight;
9. males: the hand on the same side of the outward-stepping foot is held to the hip where it impacts least on stability, and creates an angle of the arm that resembles a wing;
10. females: the scarf opens out on the sidestep - the hand on the same side of the outward-stepping foot extends to its instep, the contra hand remaining on centre-line;
11. females: the scarf closes when both hands are brought together at the hip above the closing foot.

I choose to learn both roles: to glean more context, and understand the nature of interaction between them.

The role of the rumbero as a percussionist dancer is clear: rhythms of the foot placement and the weight transfer combine to establish the framework in which the accents of the arms, head and isolated body-parts are housed; it is the same principal relationship that the tumbadora/seis por ocho drums have with the quinto. So I've chosen to approach learning to dance the guaguancó the same way I'd teach the drumming of it - framework first.

Practicing the foot placements and weight transfers, I noticed a sluggishness in my out-bound side-step signified by a lack of definition on that beat of the dance rhythm. It was a combination of two problems:

1. not getting weight over the foot quickly enough; and
2. the muscle conformation around the hips required a higher level of tone to maintain stability, so I wasn't perceiving a high enough contrast in tension-release around the joint.

Thinking on it, I solved it with one exaggerated practice: dancing the basic with a deliberate feeling of toe-in (which is quite a habit to break after a lifetime of work developing a foot turn-out). The lateral weight transfer increases load to the front of the foot, then the knee/instep, then the heel, allowing weight to be controlled/located toward the heel-side of the instep upon completion of the action. The shins become vertically parallel to each other with a decent-sized step, legs now bearing equal load properly in tempo.

But most valuable of all is the improvement in the quality of kinesthesia, making the feeling of the rhythm unmissable. It's probably the greatest boon to auditory and movement synchrony. I'm happy enough, at least for now, for this to be the making of the foundation to my guaguancó.

Loo