Closed position is usually used in the beginning of a song, before the music heats up.
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How to start a rueda
To start the rueda it is common to get the attention by calling “la rueda“, “al centro“, “vamos al medio” or something similar.
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BEGINNER LEVEL
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vamos arriba, vamos abajo
let’s go upward, let’s go downward
Arriba: There are a few variations of how to call the forward movement in this figure:
vamos arriba (let’s go upward), para arriba (upward), p’arriba (upward), arriba (up).
Abajo: Moving abajo (backwards) is similarly called with some variations:
vamos abajo (let’s go downward), abajo (down), para abajo, p’abajo (downward).
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tarro
horn, affair
There are different meanings of the word tarro. Cubans translate it with the horns of a bull,
but the street meaning in rueda is an affair (symbolically stinging your old partner with your horns).
When in vamos abajo, so when the women are moving forward, the women are the ones moving to the next partner.
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exhibela
show her off
This call is similar to sacala, but exhíbela is more commonly used in closed position, while sacala is used in open position.
Used like this, exhíbela is lead by the man’s left hand, and sacala with the right hand.
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dile que no
tell her no
This is probably the most important Cuban salsa move. If you don’t get this right, you will always struggle a bit with rueda, and most likely with Cuban salsa. Almost every partner change in rueda will include a dile que no, even though it is seldom called explicitly, for instance enchufla and dame una.
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IMPROVER LEVEL
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aguajea / paseala / adentro y afuera
‘aguajea’ is a street expression for an attitude / take her for a walk / in and out
This figure is known by many names. If you want to be flexible and able to dance rueda in various places inside and outside Cuba, it is recomended to learn at least the most common names.
aguajea para abajo /
paseala para abajo /
adentro y afuera para abajo
“adentro y afuera” backward /
“paseala” backward /
“aguajea” backward
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