![]() The dance is kind of a moving target on the Island. “We used to go out to New York and sometimes took workshops together,” she relates. ![]() When Saskia met and married David Vanderhoop, a native of Martha’s Vineyard and member of the Wampanoag Tribe, she taught him to salsa and they have been tag-teaming since. There are also elements of earlier dance forms such as cha-cha and mambo and a step or two of swing and hustle. since the 1970s, are deep in Latin forms as well as Afro-Cuban and Afro-Caribbean dances. “For a good 30 years now,” she says, “I’ve been studying salsa dancing.” She went to Cuba to learn folk dance and African dance - all of it feeding her salsa skills. “When I moved to the Dutch Antilles for about a year,” she explains, “that’s when I really got in the groove.” Later, she studied in Amsterdam where she organized the first salsa event there. She was born and raised in the Netherlands, and at 18 she began learning social dance, but salsa was still a distant dream. Saskia Vanderhoop, who, with David, founded and continues to teach at Sassafras Earth Education in Aquinnah, landed on the Island 16 years ago. He shouts again, his low voice competing with the loud thump of the music. And the music pounds again.ĭavid gets his charges moving back and forth in the basic step, then shouts “Go!” The leaders raise their arms and the followers duck under and turn. A deep voice from one group rings out “Go!” The followers turn under the arms of their partners. The groups are further divided and the leaders - a few of them women because of a shortage of men – face the followers. The music ends and the 19 students are divided into two groups based upon their ability to perform a “right hand turn.” David Vanderhoop, one of the teachers, guides the advanced participants toward the front of the room and his wife, Saskia Vanderhoop - the other teacher - corrals the beginners into the back. The dress-code is Island casual - mostly denim and tees. Retirees join construction workers and fitness experts. ![]() The dancers range in age from 20-something to golden years. The wooden floor squeaks and groans under the bouncing weight of the dancers, and workday fatigue appears to disappear. establishment, with a sort of conga line that snakes into the bar area, back into the dance area, and continues in a circle there. Salsa lessons begin at 7 pm at the Circuit Ave.
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