What Types of Casino Exist Today?

 

Once it is understood what Well-Formed Casino is, it becomes necessary to take one step further: to organize the real panorama of Casino Dance as it exists today. Because the problem is not only technical. It is also typological.



🇬🇧 What Types of Casino Exist Today? 🇬🇧

Once it is understood what Well-Formed Casino is, it becomes necessary to take one step further:

to organize the real panorama of Casino Dance as it exists today.

Because the problem is not only technical.

It is also typological.

One name, multiple realities

Today, under the name “Casino,” very different practices coexist.

This generates confusion because:

👉 the same word is used
👉 to refer to different phenomena

The result is:

  • misunderstandings,

  • conceptual mixtures,

  • and the absence of clear criteria.

General typology of Casino

From an analytical perspective, it is possible to identify four major types of empirical Casino, plus Well-Formed Casino as a differentiated category.

1. Workers’ Social Club Casino (1960s–70s)

This type of Casino corresponds to dancers:

  • born in the 1950s,

  • socially formed in the 1960s and 70s,

  • within the context of revolutionary Cuba.

Its natural space was:

👉 workers’ social clubs

Main characteristics

  • relatively upright posture

  • little mixture with rumba or Afro elements

  • strong orientation toward rueda de casino

  • limited repertoire

Fundamental technical problem

👉 backward stepping

This generates:

  • reduction of repertoire,

  • structural limitation,

  • and lower combinatory capacity.

  • stomping-type steps

In addition:

👉 they usually mark the rhythm “crossed”
(starting on beat 3)

2. Boarding-School Casino (1980s–90s)

This type emerges in:

  • boarding-school settings,

  • secondary schools, pre-university schools, polytechnic schools, etc.

Context

👉 intensive coexistence among young people
👉 almost daily practice
👉 influence of Cuban Popular Dance Music (Los Van Van, etc.)

Characteristics

  • broader repertoire

  • better timing (forward stepping)

  • greater fluency

  • dragging steps

Key observation

It remains:

👉 empirical

Although more developed than the previous type,
it still lacks a formal system.

3. Special Period / Tourism Casino (1990s)

It emerges in the context of:

👉 economic crisis
👉 opening to tourism
👉 mixed economy (State Monopoly Capitalism + Socialist Centralized Economy)

Key social figure

👉 the “jinetero” / informal cultural agent

Characteristics of the style

  • sexualization of movement and partner interaction

  • incorporation of “despelote”

  • loss of partner structure

  • emphasis on the performative

Consequence

It is projected internationally as:

👉 the representative image of Cuban dance

But in reality it is:

👉 a market-driven distortion

4. “Cuban Salsa” (development outside Cuba)

This phenomenon arises mainly:

👉 outside Cuba

and can be divided into:

a) Miami variant

  • influence of linear salsa

  • adaptation to the Latino market in the United States

b) Europe variant

  • mixture of multiple influences

  • strong tendency toward spectacle

  • marked Afro-Cubanization with mixtures of rumba and staged religious dances

General characteristics

  • technical heterogeneity

  • lack of structural definition

  • mixture of styles

  • absence of unified criteria

5. Contemporary commercial Casino

More recent.

Related to:

👉 opportunities for emigration
👉 the international market

Essential characteristic

👉 commercial orientation

Result

  • adaptation of the dance to demand

  • loss of structural identity

  • superficial standardization

Common problem of the four types

They all share something:

👉 they are empirical

This implies:

  • they are not formalized

  • they do not have a defined grammar

  • they do not have verifiable criteria

6. Well-Formed Casino (MCC)

Opposed to all of the above appears:

👉 a new category

Nature

  • non-empirical

  • methodological

  • academic

  • formalized

Characteristics

  • defined structure

  • optimized technique

  • clear language

  • high reproducibility

  • susceptible to registration through choreographic notation

Key differences

Well-Formed Casino:

  • does not mix with foreign dances

  • does not depend on the social context

  • is not amorphous

  • is not interpretive

  • high technical definition and clarity

  • high reproducibility

  • technical homogeneity among practitioners

It is:

👉 a system

Critical point

This is where today’s confusion appears:

👉 everything is called “Casino”
👉 but not everything is the same

Conclusion

What exists today is not a single homogeneous dance.

It is a set of practices with different levels of:

  • structure,

  • coherence,

  • and definition.

Typological synthesis

👉 empirical Casino = a set of non-systematized historical and commercial variants
👉 Well-Formed Casino = a structured system derived from the MCC

Continuation

In the next chapter:

Why is the term “Cuban salsa” conceptually incorrect?

Author

Yoel Marrero
Creator of the Method of the Casino Square (MCC)

Digital ecosystem

MCC 5.0 Professional Course:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/813763496367494

Casino MCC IA:
https://www.facebook.com/casinomccia

Observatory of Cuban Social Dances:
https://www.facebook.com/observatoriodebailescubanos

MCC Choreographic Catalogue:
https://www.facebook.com/FundacionCasinoParaTodosUSA

MCC Instructors Catalogue:
https://www.facebook.com/catalogoinstructoresmccpatentados

YouTube Channel:
https://www.youtube.com/@CATALOGOCOREOGRAFICOMCC

Baile Social Inteligente Blog:
https://bailesocialinteligente.blogspot.com/


#MCC #MethodOfTheCasinoSquare #WellFormedCasino #CasinoDance #CubanSalsa #CubanDance #CubanSocialDances #YoelMarrero #CasinoTypology #ChoreographicAnalysis #MCCSystem #TechniqueSetsYouFree


MCC, Method of the Casino Square, Well-Formed Casino, types of Casino, Cuban salsa, Cuban dance, choreographic analysis, Casino structure, Yoel Marrero, MCC system, evolution of dance, Cuban dance studies

Technique sets you free.

Location: Av. Sierra de Las Nieves, 2, 29410 Yunquera, Málaga, España

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