Samba

The official dance of Brazil. The roots of the Samba are in Africa, it is a lively dance which was first introduced in 1917 and was finally adopted and developed further as a ballroom dance by Brazilian society in 1930. The dance is recognized from the Carnival Parties and Samba Schools of Brazil. In 1925 the Samba was imported into Europe. Although the samba was already accepted as a competition Dance, the great breakthrough of the Samba happened on the World exhibition in New York in 1939. Europe was really captured by the Samba in 1948/1949. Walter Laird with partner Lorraine developed the Samba enormously.

The Samba is a rhythmical dance in 2/4 time which has been adapted for modern Ballroom dancing and incorporated into the repertoire of the International Standard syllabus. Unlike the other Latin dances that are stationary, the Samba has a traveling action around the floor with lots of spins and controlled bounces. The typical Samba Bounce is one of the distinguishing characteristics of this dance. The Samba movements should reflect a “parading” circling in space often flavoring to the audience with no travelling and remaining on one spot. This Latin dance has a tempo of about 100 beats per minute.