Fun Friday

Yesterday we went to see Kings of Salsa at a nearby theater. I hadn’t been sure I even wanted to go, but when we found a way to buy some half-price tickets we figured we’d give it a shot. The last time we went to a salsa-music concert we became bored by repetitious music and were afraid it would happen again. It didn’t. We definitely were not bored.

For starters, our seats turned out to be quite good. Our half-price entry got us into the center of the mezzanine, far enough away that the music wouldn’t be painfully loud but still close enough that we could see well. This was our first experience buying half-price tickets from Goldstar, and we’re impressed that we got decent seats. With other agencies, our half-price tickets generally led to the worst seats in the house.

We both loved the show. The group played a variety of salsa styles, and accompanied nearly all of the music with fabulously-beautiful dancing. These folks didn’t count out standard eight step patterns, but performed far more complex pieces reminiscent of modern dance based on classical fundamentals. Alla liked the show so much that she tried to get a ticket to see the show again today, though she didn’t succeed.

We did see a little standard eight-step salsa after the intermission. They invited the audience onto the stage, and a cast of brave dancers took them up on it. The master of ceremonies asked some of the best dancers about themselves. The first guy said that his name was Andrew and he came from Belarus. We had noticed a few people speaking Russian in the lobby and knew anyway that the audience would include Russians because we see them at every cultural event in Boston. So the Russians began to applaud. I probably made more noise than the rest of them, however. I found myself yelling at the top of my lungs, “BELARUUUUUS!” People turned to look.

After the audience members cleared from the stage, the band invited a local musician to sit in with them. A Cuban professor of piano at Berklee College of Music came up and offered us a completely different interpretation of salsa style. The party never really ended. The troupe performed the planned second half of the show, said goodbye, and then apologized to the theater management and kept right on playing. We stayed until they decided they’d really better quit, perhaps before the big shots decided to shut off the lights. We loved it so much that Alla decided it was her favorite show of the whole year.

From 2011-10 Boston