Learn About Rumba Dance: 8 Popular Styles of Rumba

Rumba is a form of partnered Latin dance that focuses on hip movements and footwork danced in time to the beat of rumba music. The rumba is characterized by close partner work, a still upper body, and slow swaying hips and footwork that follows a slow-quick-quick pattern (American style) or a quick-quick-slow pattern (International style). The rumba is slower than some other Latin dances, giving it a more romantic quality and representing a fusion of African and Spanish dance styles.

Rumba is typically danced to the Afro-Cuban popular dance music style also called “rumba.” The rumba dance can refer to different dance styles in several different contexts. In Afro-Cuban dance clubs, the rumba can include many Cuban dance styles, such as Son, Yambu, and Guaguancó. Rumba is also a ballroom dance in Latin dancesport competitions comprising three styles: the American rumba, the international style, and the Bolero.

The rumba originated in Cuba in the sixteenth century among Africans enslaved by Spanish colonists in Cuba as a rare form of expression. After slavery was outlawed in Cuba in 1886, parties and social gatherings among Afro-Cubans in cities like Havana are where many social dances, including the rumba, were performed and continued to evolve. Through these parties, rumba gained prominence among Cuba’s upper and upper-middle classes, who adapted this rumba to be slower and less hip-focused, developing the “son” and “Danzón” styles of rumba.

Rumba gained in popularity in the United States in the 1920s, when band leader Emil Coleman brought rumba musicians and dancers from Cuba to New York. Rumba gained further recognition in the US in 1933 when Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers danced the rumba in their first film together, Flying Down to Rio. Today, the rumba is a popular style of dance, featured in ballroom dance competitions worldwide.

The modern rumba has a series of key characteristics that make it stand out from many other dance styles. Here are some of the key characteristics of the modern rumba.

1. 1. Slower speed: The rumba is the slowest of the five Latin dancesport styles (the others being samba, jive, cha-cha-cha, and paso doble). The slower speed of rumba dancing allows dancers to accentuate the sensuality of the partner work, with slow hip actions and long, elegant arm movements.
2. 2. Focus on hip movements: Rumba is characterized by what’s known as the Cuban motion of the hips, which is a circular rotation of the hips as the knees bend while the spine remains straight. In rumba, the hips are meant to move naturally as the feet move.
3. 3. Three-step footwork: The rumba is danced with a three-step basic progression of footwork. Within a four-beat bar of music, the feet step on each beat and hold for one beat. The rhythm of the rumba may change, depending on the style of rumba you’re dancing.
4. 4. Romance: The rumba is sometimes called the "dance of love." When people dance the rumba, they will elongate movements that involve their partner to highlight the sensuality of the dance.

Rumba has evolved into many different variations performed competitively in different parts of the world. Here are five different styles of rumba dance.

1. 1. Columbia: Columbia is a form of rumba that men traditionally perform. It is a single dance rather than a partner dance, with the featured dancer performing a more aggressive, irreverent version of the typical slow-quick-quick step. Columbia dance requires performers to execute difficult moves that require lots of physical strength.
2. 2. Guaguancó: Guacuancó is one of the partner styles of rumba full of sexual tension, typically beginning with one partner (often the man) trying to catch the other partner’s attention. The second partner and first partner go back and forth, alternating with moments of seduction and coquettish denial.
3. 3. Yumba: Yumba is a slow style of rumba focused less on sexual tension, and more on the ease of movement. Dancers who practice this style are typically older.
4. 4. Son: Son was the first style of rumba to emerge from the original Cuban rumba. The steps are slower and more conservative, with less pronounced hip movement than the Cuban rumba. This was the favored style among the middle class in Cuba in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
5. 5. Danzón: Danzón rumba was also favored by the wealthier class of Cuba, and was even slower and more subtle than the Son. The steps taken by the women were very small and their hip movements were also smaller than Cuban rumba.
6. 6. American rumba: American rumba is one of the first ballroom rumba styles to originate in the United States. In the American style, the basic step is danced as a box step, with the movements happening on the first, third, and fourth counts of a measure. The swiveling hip motion is performed by stepping onto a bent leg and then straightening it.
7. 7. International rumba: In the international style of rumba, steps are danced on the second, third and fourth counts of the measure. The basic step of this dance goes back and forth, rather than the box step of the American style. This motion is danced differently than the American style, as the dancer steps onto a straight leg and then bends to move their hips.
8. 8. Bolero rumba: The bolero rumba is the slowest of the three ballroom rumbas. The bolero employs more body rise through the knees to draw out the length of the steps because it is slower.

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