The Cha Cha History

The cha cha history is long; in 1952 when Pierre Margolie; English dance teacher visited Cuba, he noticed that there were certain times the Rumba dance was performed with some extra beats. This was a 1948 innovation introduced by Enrique Jorrin, who was a musician. Jorrin combined two dances from Cuba known as the Muntuno and the Danzon to come up with the Cha Cha history. When Pierre went back to Britain, he began teaching the steps separately as a dance.

Cha cha history has it that the name Cha Cha was probably derived from the Spanish word ‘Chacha’ which means ‘nurse maid’ or the word ‘chachar’ that means ‘to chew leaves’ by (Smith 1971,161) .It may have also been derived from ‘char’ that meant ‘tea’ or from the cheerful and fast Cuban dance that was known as Guaracha. Prior to the century’s turn, the Guaracha dance was a very popular dance in Europe .For instance; it is included in the listed on Dancie Neill’s, Finishing Assembly program held in Scotland’s Coupar Angus in1898.

There have been suggestions that the Cha Cha name could have been derived onomatopoeically from the feet’s sound made within the chasse that is involved in a number of the dance steps. This made some people to refer to the dance as Cha Cha after the resulting rhythm.

The difference comes about mainly as a result of the type of musical bar beat being stressed in the dancing: the forth beat in the first instance and the first beat in the second case.

The dance was also referred to as “Mambo with a guiro rhythm” in Cha Cha history in the year 1952.The guiro, a musical type of instrument, which entails a usually dried gourd played by rubbing serrated sticks. It is also suggested that the Cha Cha name came from the resonance made by the seeds as the guiro is shaken.

The Mambo was originally from Haiti and made its way to the West through Prado (Burchfield, 1976, II/809) in 1948. “Mambo” referred to the voodoo priestesses in the Negro religion stemming from Africa. This therefore, made the Cha Cha history be traced to the religious ritual Western Africa dances. There are three known Mambo forms namely; triple, double and the single forms. The triple form consists of five steps in a bar. It is this dance version that later evolved into Cha Cha.

Currently, Cha Cha is danced at a speed of about one hundred and twenty beats in a minute. The steps are usually in sync with the beats and are accompanied with strong hip movements. The knees are usually let to straighten in between the half beats. The body weight is put forward as the forward steps are taken when the toes are flat. The dance is performed with minimum movement being placed on the upper torso. The four and one chasse, serves the purpose of emphasizing the step made on the first beat. According to the Cha Cha history, this could be held for a slightly longer duration than the rest of the steps to go with the emphasized music beat.