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Types of Dances

Types of Dances

You can call it an art form or a sport, but Dance generally refers to the rhythmic movement of the body to music. It can be used for personal expression, social interaction or even spiritual performances. Dance is deep rooted in all cultures across the world and every region has its own unique interpretation of the same.

The array of dance styles across the world is limitless. So, it is very hard to choose one as your favourite. We would recommend that you try the following dance genres to find what you are most comfortable with:

Ballet: Ballet is a result of centuries of development of dance techniques and is said to be the foundation for various other dance styles and genres. Ballet dancers use dance and music to tell stories to the audience.

Indian Bollywood: Bollywood dance is what you typically see Hritik Roshan or Shahid Kapoor performing in commercial film songs. It is a blend of classical Indian, folk dances, bhangra, Hip Hop and even some western dance forms. There are no boundaries to Bollywood dance, but generally speaking, it involves using hand and leg movements and facial expressions and is one of the best dance forms to learn if you're new to dancing.

Jazz: The true spirit of Jazz lies in creativity and inventiveness. It offers dancers a great degree of self-expression by incorporating different styles of dance into their movements.

Hip-Hop: This style of dance is born from the suburban culture and their expressions. Hip-hop involves popping, locking, breaking and even house dance. One of the most popular forms of dancing in the present times owing largely to music artists and pub culture.

Swing: One of the liveliest forms of dance where couples jump, spin and swing together. It was extremely popular from 1920s to the 40s during the 'Jazz decades'.

Western and Country: You've probably seen dancers with big boots and cowboy hats dancing with great smiles on their faces. Western dancing includes several dance forms and is popular in country clubs and taverns.

Belly Dancing: A unique dance form with exquisite movements of the hips and abdomens. The art of belly dancing is quite popular with teenage girls largely owing to musical performers such as Shakira.

Flamenco: A popular Spanish form of dance with a wonderful mix of the song, the guitar and elaborate hand and body movements. This expressive dance form is a blend of lively body movements and percussive music.

Latin Dance: This form of dance is renowned for its passionate energy and sensual hip movements. Fast-paced movements to the lively music, Latin Dance is considered to be a form of sensual expression.

Salsa: Probably the most popular form of dance around the world, Salsa originated in the Caribbean. When reading about Salsa, there's extensive mention of Cuban, Colombian and Puerto Rico based dance forms. Gradually it came to the US and we got what is popularly known as the New York Salsa style. It is a wide-spread form of dance performed by couples in night-clubs, halls, pubs and outdoors throughout Europe and the Americas. Performing Salsa is almost an essential skill that one must know.

Tap: A unique form of percussive dancing where the dancer uses the metal plates on his shoes to tap against a hard surface to create a mesmerising dance form. This form of dance is extremely popular in America, Ireland and Britain.

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