The competition, which begins on March 16th, is being organized by Jennifer Aucoin, in association with Ibiza Promotions. Jennifer is the founder of Steps Dance Studio, the organizer of the annual Canada Salsa Congress and was the organizer of the Berlin Salsa Competition from 1998-2003. She brings her organizational expertise and her years of experience as a professional dancer, instructor and choreographer to help make this one of the most prestigious salsa competitions in Canada.

The Toronto Salsa Competition features over $10 000 in prizes, including a trip for 2 to the World Salsa Congress in Puerto Rico.

Great news!!! The Toronto Salsa Competition at Acrobat Lounge will be sending their finalist to the Puerto Rico Salsa Open in July. The 1st place winners in the professional category will not only win a trip for 2 to the Puerto Rico Salsa Congress (9 days and 8 nights of accommodation, airfare and congress passes) but will also be the only couple to represent Ontario in the Puerto Rico Salsa Open competition where they will be given a chance to win the grand prize of $10 000 US (2nd place is $3000 US and 3rd place is $2000 US).

Locations

Acrobat Cocktail Lounge, 2464 Yonge St., will host the preliminaries and semi-finals. The finals will be held at the Capitol Event Theatre, 2492 Yonge St., four blocks north of Eglinton.

Registration

Only five couples per category will be allowed to enter on each night of the preliminaries. To register in advance, contact Jennifer. If there are still spots left on a particular night, people may then register in person with Jennifer at Acrobat before 10 p.m. that night.

Categories

This year there will be two categories. Please read the following descriptions carefully. Any person caught entering the wrong category will be disqualified from the whole contest. If you have any questions or doubts as to which category you belong to, please ask Jennifer before you compete!!!

Amateur
You are in the amateur category if:

• Neither competitor has performed
• Neither competitor has ever taught salsa
• Neither is or has been a member of a salsa dance company

Professional
You are in the professional category if:

• One or both of you has performed (with or without being paid)
• One or both of you has taught a class or assisted a salsa instructor (with or without being paid)
• One or both of you is or has been a member of a salsa dance company (whether or not you have been paid for performing)

Dates

Please note that this year, both categories (professional and amateur) are welcome to enter into any preliminary round. Each couple, however, will only be judged against those in their respective category.

Tuesday, March 16	Preliminaries for amateurs and professionals
Tuesday, March 23	Preliminaries for amateurs and professionals
Tuesday, March 30	Preliminaries for amateurs and professionals
Tuesday, April 13	Preliminary round for amateurs from out of town (10:20pm sharp!) Semi-finals for amateur category
Friday, April 16	Preliminary round for professionals from out of town (10:20pm sharp!) Semi-finals for professional category
Friday, April 23	Finals for both categories at the Capitol Event Theatre.

Preliminaries

• Contestants, please check-in with Jennifer by 10 p.m.

• Contest will begin at approximately 10:30 p.m.

• All couples will dance at the same time to a warm-up song (not to exceed 1:30 minutes)

• Each couple will then dance for 2 minutes to a song chosen by the dj, starting with amateur competitors and then pro (all couples in the same category will dance to the same song)

• Contestants will be judged by 2 judges

• Costumes are not required

• Every contestant will receive a VIP pass for Acrobat for the duration of the contest

• 3 couples will be chosen from each category each week to advance to the semi-finals. If a couple does not advance, they are welcome to try again during another preliminary round.

• Competitors may keep their scoresheets if requested.

• Competitors who do not live in the greater Toronto area (ie. those who travel from Ottawa, Montreal, Detroit, Windsor, etc.) will be allowed to enter a preliminary round at 10:20 p.m. on the night of the semi-finals for their respective category. Only 5 couples will be allowed to enter, so please register early. 3 of the 5 couples will be chosen by the judges to compete in the semi-final round a half hour later.

Semi-Finals

• Semi-finals for the amateur category will be held on Tuesday, April 13 at Acrobat Lounge.

• Semi-finals for the professional category will be held on Friday, April 16 at Acrobat Lounge.

• All contestants must check in with Jennifer by 9:30pm sharp on the day of the semi-finals.

• There will NOT be a warm-up song for the competitors.

• Each couple will dance 2 minutes to a fast-paced salsa chosen by the dj. Each couple in the same category will be dancing to a different song.

• This will allow the contestants to demonstrate how well they can improvise, stay on beat and interpret the music.

• Costumes are not required but are encouraged (ie. costumes will not be judged but they may contribute to the overall presentation score)

• One person from each couple will be asked to wear a fabric number sign pinned to their back.

• There will be a panel of 4 judges who all have several years of experience teaching salsa and who all have experience performing and/or competing.

• Placement in the semi-finals will not be announced, only which couples are advancing to the finals.

• Contestants will receive their scoresheets at the end of the evening.

• The top 6 couples (out of a maximum of 12, ie. 9 from each preliminary round plus 3 from preliminary round for out-of-towners) in each category will advance to the finals.

Finals

• Finals for both amateur and professional categories will be held at the beautiful Capitol Event Theatre on Friday, April 23.

• Contestants will perform on the Capitol Theatre stage.

• All contestants must check in with Jennifer by 9:00pm sharp!!

• Each category of contestants will dance together to a warm-up song (not to exceed 1:30 minutes) immediately before that category competes (ie. amateurs will all dance a warm-up song together and then each amateur couple will compete individually then the pros will warm-up together, etc.)

• Contestants will perform a choreographed showcase of their choice that must be between 1:45-2:15 minutes in duration

• Song chosen for the finals must be at least 90% salsa

• Only CDs will be accepted and must be clearly labeled with participants’ names. To avoid any problems, there must only be ONE TRACK on the CD!

• Costumes are not required but are encouraged (ie. costumes will not be judged but they may contribute to the overall presentation score)

• One person from each couple will be asked to wear a fabric number sign pinned to their back.

• There will be a panel of 4-6 judges who all have several years of experience teaching salsa and who all have experience performing and/or competing.

Additional Rules & Tips

• There are no restrictions on dips or lifts (but please remember that salsa is not just about dips and lifts!!)

• There are no restrictions on separating from your partner while dancing

• 5 marks will be deducted from a couple’s total score in the finals if they dance for less than 1:45 minutes or more than 2:15 minutes

• Dancers will be judged in 5 categories (technical skills, couple dynamics, style, showmanship and timing). Please see example of scoresheet for more information

• Please note that timing will be worth twice as much as each of the other categories (see sample scoresheet). It does not matter what beat you dance on, but it is important that you dance on a consistent beat for the entire routine.
  All judges will be judging timing based on the following criteria:
  • Staying on consistent beat throughout whole song = 10/10
  • Changing between the 1 and the 5 (or 2 and 6, or 3 and 7) = 8/10
  • Changing from 1 to 3 (or vice versa) = 5/10
  • Not staying on any consistent beat = 2/10
  (if you do not understand what we mean by the above, please call Jennifer)

Judging Sheets & Marking Criteria

The following links lead to the Excel worksheets used by the judges in the competition. If you click on them, you may be asked to save them on your computer, or they may simply open in the browser, depending on your system. If you want to download the files to your machine, click with your right-hand mouse button and choose, "Save Target As...".

• Marking criteria
• Preliminaries judging sheet
• Finals judging sheet