Music Café regular hopes to start salsa club

Goal is to turn a Friday night passion into an MU organization

By Meredith MacKenzie
Adelante Staff

Oblivious to the packed bar around him, MU junior Steven Perry draws all eyes to his dance partner, Emily Orphan, as he deftly maneuvers her across the small, crowded dance floor at the Music Café. Other dancers move out of their way just to get a better look as the couple dances in perfect syncopation to the music of the salsa band, Abatería.

He whips her into a spin that blurs the space between them, and she never loses a step. Her hand runs down his back as he turns around to face her again. They are the axis of the club, the center around which rapid-fire Latin rhythm revolves.

Perry goes to the Café’s Latin Night every Friday, but once a week is simply not enough. He’s also rallying other Friday night regulars to form a Latin Dance Club at MU. Perry is trying to win approval for the club with the university's Organizational Resource Group and the vice-chancellor.

He’s already mustered the mandatory 10 potential members, and far more than 10 people have expressed interest. He’s single-handedly crafted a constitution, a requirement for each MU club. And now there is nothing left to do but wait for approval — nothing to do except appear religiously at Music Café each Friday.

Perry says his goal isn’t to compete with the University’s Ballroom Dance Club, where many of the dancers on his roster currently learn, practice and compete. “The foxtrot, the tango, the waltz, I respect and appreciate them,” Perry says. “I just don’t want to do them.” He hopes that the Latin Dance Club will complement the existing club.

Meghan Mercier, a freshman, dances with the Ballroom Dance Club’s competition division and won honors this year at competitions in Champaign-Urbana, Ill., and St. Louis. She’s been dancing for 10 years, but she picked up a love of Latin dance at the beginning of this year. She sees the Latin Dance Club as a learning opportunity for more than dance.

“I really think that we’re there to learn different Latin dances that other people might not know,” she said. “I think that it will be a sharing in culture in addition to dance.”

Looking out over the dance floor at the Music Café, the richness of culture is abundant. Salsa, merengue, samba and cha-cha are just a sampling of many dance steps. Cultural barriers dissolve in smooth Latin sounds. Color and language become swept up in dance. “It really is a melting pot of cultures,” Perry said.

Perry didn't always appreciate salsa this way.“The ironic thing is that at first Latin dance was…culturally uncomfortable,” he said. “Latin dancing wasn’t cool; it was too nice, too innocent.”

But he developed a passion for salsa simply by observing others. Watching him move at the Music Café it is easy to imagine Perry as a teacher. Perry hopes the club will provide not only a chance to learn the moves, but also an opportunity to share his love of Latin dances.

Perry said that he plans to use “guerilla marketing tactics” — posting fliers all over campus, working a table at Brady Commons, passing out handbills — to publicize the club. On a more personal note, his skills at what he calls “the art form of salsa” and his magnetic smile have already attracted many future members. Vince Demarest, an MU student who began learning Latin dance while living in Guatemala and Costa Rica, became friends with Perry at Music Café. Demarest said the dancing is different there than at other clubs, where anyone can bump and grind and the focus is on picking up girls, “I like (salsa) a lot; there is actual skill to doing it,” Demarest said.

Perry hopes that sharing his passion for salsa through the club will prepare novices for Latin Night, a liberating ritual he takes seriously. “It’s comparable to a spiritual experience, getting lost on the dance floor,” he said. “When I’m out there it’s like the rest of the club just disappears.”