INTROUDCTION

Salsa in Israel started in Tel-Aviv in 1989.

It has come a long way since those early days when the only salsa club was a small pub right next to the American embassy on HaYarkon St. (club Sigal), where the founders of the Israeli salsa were first introduced to the dance and music like myself.

Most of the dancing crowd in those days were Latin workers who lived in Israel and wanted a small corner in which they could practice habits from their home culture. A few Israelis that used to hang out in that pub fell in love with the music and dance and basically this is how salsa started in Israel.

The big breakthrough happened in 1991 when the Tel-Aviv university, along with Sander Melichson (salsa D.J. & instructor), opened the student club "Focus" and started teaching the basic steps of the Salsa as well as the other Latin rhythm dances. When the Israelis discovered Salsa it was so appealing that soon enough one was able to find Salsa clubs all over Tel-Aviv.

Israel major problem was, and still is, that there are not enough people to justify the opening of big and elegant clubs and only a few clubs survived.

The significant breakthrough happened in 1996.

At the beginning of 1996 a salsa lover, Shlomi Haim went on a trip to Cuba for two months. When he returned he brought back to club Maxim a new dance that was already very popular all over the world and especially in Cuba the "Salsa Casino Rueda" as well as the basic Cuban salsa style.

This was what Israel needed, it took about one year to teach enough Israelis to dance the Cuban style and soon enough you could find lots of places where you could learn the "Salsa Casino Rueda".

The similarity between the Rueda and the Israeli folk dancing (dancing in a circle as well as with couples) attracted lots of Israelis to come and learn the Rueda. From there the next step of coming to the clubs and going out to salsa every night they could was a short route.

So now you can find salsa all over Israel nevertheless the best dancers and club are located in Tel-Aviv.

As the salsa scenery keeps growing. I hope that in the near future one can have the ability to choose a salsa club from a number of clubs operating on the same night, according to the decor the music and the crowd and still all the clubs will be full of salseros.

The Israeli dance style is a combination of many different styles such as the Cuban and the Columbian and some influence from the sixties dance. Most of the dancers prefer to do a lot of turns and lots of complicated hand/body combinations mostly on the very fast and new age salsa music. You can have a better idea on Israeli salsa if you will read "Edie The SalsaFreak" notes from her visit to Israel on "The Israeli Salseros"

Have fun and see you at the clubs.
Ronen (Paco) Biran