What is Balboa?

Balboa is a partner dance that is typically danced to faster swing/jazz music. It is known for its elegance and focus on the partnership connection.

While the dance can be performed as a choreography, Balboa is first and foremost a 'social dance', which means there is no fixed sequence of moves. Togetherness/moving in sync is achieved because a) there is shared knowledge of common moves/movements and b) a type of wordless communication exists in the partnership when each dancer is, in real time, constantly registering/responding to the physical impact of their own movement on the other and vice versa. This is the "connection", and it is what is at the heart of the dance.

I believe that the most helpful thing you can be aware of, starting off, is that it takes time to develop this connection. The connection is like music only the body can register. Yes, Balboa can be beautiful to watch with the eyes, but this is almost equivalent to watching musicians play and not being able to hear the music. The point is not how it looks. The point is how it sounds to the body. It does, however, take volumes and volumes of dialogue to get there :)