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Where salsa comes from

10.Why this matters for you as a dancer

Every salsa song is built on the clave rhythm, even when nobody plays it: it's the pattern the musicians line their parts up with, so you feel it more than you hear it. Every salsa break step — the moment you rock back and change direction — comes from the old son and mambo dance step. When you dance salsa, your feet are repeating a pattern that Cuban dancers were already doing 100 years ago.

Knowing this history will not make you dance better right away. But it helps you feel why the steps feel the way they do, and why salsa connects so many countries and generations.

ListenEl CantanteHéctor Lavoe · 1978Written by Rubén Blades for Héctor Lavoe, it's a classic of the salsa dance floor. You won't hear clave sticks on this recording, and that's normal: the piano, the bass and the percussion all follow the clave, so it's there in how they fit together, not as a sound of its own.