Rumba is a dance that has left traces in cuban salsa, particularly in the styling. It has rich, layered percussion and is one of the slower Cuban dances. To me, it has a gooey toffee quality to it, arms sweeping with each step. Its movement are smooth, very African with full use of the shoulders, the hips, the arms. It doesn't have 'footwork' or step patterns as such, it's just about transferring your weight at the right times and doing this softly within the music and doing it so it fits with your partner (but you can dance Rumba on your own. Sometimes men dance Rumba against each other. Trust men to make it competitive).
The 'vacuna' I mentioned in an earlier post is, I suppose, its own competition. He tries to catch her out with a swift hip, hand, knee or foot movement and she has to block him. They are dancing together but battling at the same time.
Here is a clip of some Cuban Rumba. See if you can spot the vacuna attempts. To help you out, the first one happens at 00:16 (and is successfully blocked). She's not always so quick.
Ballroom Rumba, on the other hand, is something entirely, totally completely different. Ballroom has ruined many a dance such as Samba and Tango, mostly by standardising, formalising and regulating every inch of the dancers body and form and creating some (in my opinion) ugly movements. The biggest difference is that Ballroom Rumba is danced with a straight back, straight arms and the dancers step on a straight leg. In Cuban Rumba on the other hand, the only thing that's straight is the dancers.
Here's some ballroom rumba:
perhaps I'm just a snob but ballroom rumba makes me reach for the sick bag. To get that awful ballroom stuff out of my head, I'm going to watch Rafael and Janet show you how to do it right:
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