SOS and Nina

November 25, 2007

Originally SOS was not in my plans because of seemingly too full Salsa calendar of late. However I changed my mind because of combination of unexpected lessening of workload for the weekend and all-too-disappointing Friday.

I thought I would be the only one from Cambridge. I was wrong. Johnny and Serap were there for the first time in a very long time. Sebastian decided to use his last weekend here to check out SOS for the first time with Kate. Vera was there too. The biggest surprise by far was Nina – here for a long Salsa weekend (Scala-SOS-Bar Salsa). It was super nice to catch up with her, and we ended up chatting through most of one Salsa song (El Verdadero Son) and one Bachata before dancing to a very slow Cuban-ie song (at least according to Nina).

Amir was the DJ. The music was really good, and I think I recognized about a third of the songs. They included Anuncio Clasificado (Willie Rosario), Dejame Sonar (Tito Puente & Tony Vega - surprisingly tricky), Hay Craneo (Tito Rodriguez - Helen), Ya No Puede Ser (Celia Cruz, Ray Barretto, Adalberto Santiago), La La La (Direct Latin Influence - or did I imagine this one?), Avisale A Mi Contrario (Roberto Roena), Sofrito (Mongo Santamaria), El Verdadero Son (Javier Vazquez), Paz (Frankie Dante), Ahora De Me Pana (Henry Fiol), Sun Sun Babae (version unknown).

Least favorite scene for me this evening was a crowd watching Leon Rose dance with some visitor. Things he was trying seemed rather experimental and nutty and absolute did not fit the music. They were watching a freak show and seemed to think that they were watching something great – it really wasn’t. I have no real objection to Leon trying something crazy and experimenting on social dance floor. However, I think that if it were some no name couple tried what they were doing, most bystanders would have looked down upon it rather than admiring it. But maybe I'm the clueless one here.

There were some good dances tonight. Also there were surprisingly many substandard dances. Probably the dance I had most fun with was to Paz (Frankie Dante) – a surprise because I didn’t think it was a particularly good song and a non-surprise because Sergio mentioned it as a good one (I guess I should have trusted Sergio). Other notable dances were to Ahora De Me Pena (Henry Fiol) – it was the next to last dance of the evening. Hay Craneo (Tito Rodriguez) was also interesting because of Helen, who seemingly was dying to show off as a spinning machine.

On the whole it was a good SOS evening. Music was well above average. Dancing was about average. Social factor was well above avearage. Everything else was average by SOS standard. It was better than I expected, and I'm glad I went.