Experienced tutor in Dance in Palatine, Dora offers private lessons tailored to your needs.

I have been taking private salsa lessons with Dora for about 2 months. Prior to this, I had zero background with salsa, and had never tried it because I was a little self conscious about going out and taking a group class without any experience.

After two months with Dora, I feel confident that I could go in a group or social dance setting and look like I know what I am doing with the basics of salsa. Again, this is with absolutely zero experience prior to my first lesson with her, so I think this says a lot about her ability to teach and build confidence .

Dora is a great choice for a teacher if you are someone like me and maybe a little unsure of whether you could really learn this well enough to go out in a social setting. Dora has made the lessons fun, but more importantly she has taken a genuine interest in making sure I am actually learning what I need to know to be able to go out in a social setting and be confident with this.

I thought that Dora is a great instructor in teaching fundamentals of Salsa—frame and timing. She emphasizes these two skills until you get them, because these skills are very important. Don’t take them lightly. Why are they important? Because I have had great experiences as follows:

(1) I can connect with the music and the person I dance with. Particularly, as a lead, I am responsible for the whole dancing experiences including the follow’s as well. Off-the-timing moves are annoying to the follow, although she does not show her dissatisfaction in her face to be polite (I know this from my experiences of actually following as an experiment). Keeping frame allows the dancers to feel 0 G-force during dancing when the velocities of forces from the lead and follow get to equivalent in the opposite direction. It is like excitement you would get in an amusement park. You can never get to this if you use “Spaghetti” arms. Salsa seems to look “sexy” to the eyes of watchers of it, but for the dancers, Salsa actually seems like the lead constantly transmitting force to the follow, who in turns uses it to move herself graciously. None of these excitement can be achieved without good frame and timing.

(2) A great dancer sometimes comes back to me for more dances. I do not have so many varieties of moves in Salsa. Actually, I am bored with myself because it seems I am repeating the same set of moves. However, this does not seem to matter to the follows. All I do is sticking to the accuracy of timing and keeping frame all the time. Sometimes, I happen to dance with a great dancer once at a social dancing venue. Then, after some songs later, she in turn comes back to me for another dance. Experience like this is always a rewarding moment for sticking to timing and frame.

(3) “No” becomes no longer personal. Social anxiety diminished. When I started dancing socially, it was a big deal of getting “no” from a lady for whatever reasons she might have had. I took it very personally, and it was embarrassing to get no in public. But, it was helpful believing to have a set of dancing frame and skills, with which I had great experiences with other dancers before. Now, when I get a “no”, simply ask other persons for the dance. Actually, it now feels like I am gently offering a dance rather than asking for it. Even if it is a good product, someone may take it; someone may not take it.

Also, I found Dora kindly answers my questions about dancing. As I have more experiences in dancing, I come to struggle performing some moves that I thought I have had. It is probably because I become more aware of every single move as I experience dancing. When I ask a question to her personally or via email, she takes time to respond to me. She has given a few small tips, but they improve the move graciously.

I would strongly recommend Dora if you want to learn fundamentals of Salsa and change your belief in a social setting.