The end of XIX century witnessed the emergence of Danzón, which musical creation was assigned to the Matanzas-born Miguel Faílde (1852-1921). The first Danzón was entitled Las Alturas de Simpson and its debut was on January 1, 1879 at the Matanzas Lyceum. Body and space movements of this new genre were slower, with much more cadenza and creative freedom than in the preceding dances and all of this denotes the stylistic transformation suffered by Cuban ballroom dances from Contradanza to Danzón.

… From the choreographic point of view, Danzón has, as unique and new feature in its epoch, the alternation of dancing and no dancing parts … Nowadays, Danzón is considered our national dance in Cuba.

Son had its origin around the end of XIX century in the ‘’Montuneros’’ suburbs of some cities from the oriental part of the country, such as Guantánamo, Baracoa, Manzanillo and Santiago de Cuba and it was the most representative dancing of the humble population. It moved to Havana around 1909 through different migrations and soldiers of the permanent army. Son was not accepted at elegant rooms, but it defeated these social barriers as soon as it was gaining popularity. It was danced at salons and dancing academies. Its first glamour was around the 20s and 30s, shining on trios, sextets, septets, achieving its highest broadcasting level with ensembles and jazz bands very popular at that time.

Along the entire island, diverse branches of son were developed: changüí (Guantánamo), sucu suco (Isla de Pinos), country pantomimic son (in Majagua and Las Tunas), son from Havana, among others.
However, from the choreographic point of view, two major styles are visible in this genre: son montuno, exhibiting a prominent movement of the upper part of the body towards both sides, deep flexions of legs allowing constant movements of the body up and down and frequent up-and-down gesticulations of the arms, called by specialists as ‘’draw out water of the well’’; and the urban son, with more gentle, soft and elegant movements, the position as social dance is straighter, the legs flexion is less and no arms movements, previously described, are visible.

Cha cha chá on the other hand, which is considered by musicologist Miriam Lay Bravo as the last element of the Danzón generic complex, was the outcome of a creative process which specifically began on the so-called Danzón of new rhythm. The Danzón-Mambo was the first creation recognized as exponent of this generic combination which also had influences of Son and later Mambo and was created by Orestes López, member of the popular orchestra Arcaño y sus maravillas.

Enrique Jorrín, outstanding Cuban violinist, composer and director is considered the creator of Cha cha chá. This genre was born due to the necessity of creating something different taking as starting point the danzón itself. Its definition as a new musical modality was definitive when the piece La Engañadora appeared in 1949, although it was not popular until 1951, when its author recorded a disc that quickly got high broadcast levels.
Cha cha chá as danceable manifestation is anonymous. Jorrín himself has stated in diverse interviews:
There`s no dances preceding the music. There isn’t a first Cha cha chá either. It was an evolution process [...]. The Silver Star Orchestra’s boys were the first ones dancing that rhythm that will be named later Cha Cha Chá. The Silver Star was a society of blacks which often used to hire the América Orchestra. Within it, the seeds of this new musical genre were forming up. Then, around the early years of the 50’s, this dance appeared at one of the most visited ballrooms of the capital: Prado y Neptuno, where La Engañadora made its bow also in the interpretation of América Orchestra.

In Cha Cha Chá, the basic rhythmic cell is a stylistic evolution of the Cuban ballroom dancing, because the basic step corresponds to the rhythm of the guiro, which is a distinguishing feature in relation to its predecessors. It can be danced not only by couples in position of closed social dance, but also by single dancers. To be continued…

By Bárbara Balbuena. Courtesy of Cubadisco Newspaper