Ultimate Strictly

SAMBA

History

The Samba is a latin dance whose origins go back to Africa; the name derives from a Bantu word meaning 'to pray' and the dance itself is thought to have been a way of calling out to and worshipping the gods. It was modified throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries in the United States, and became popular in Europe in the 1920's. The first formal rules for the Samba danced in the ballroom competitions date to the 1950's. So modern Samaba is a mixture of African steps with Brazilian music and rhythms, giving us the Mardi Gras in the ballroom.

The dance

When watching the Samba, you should be transported to the carnivals of Rio. It's a very rhythmical dance which should have lots of bounce action, fluid hip movement throughout, but the dancers must move together in perfect unison.

There are lots of fantastically exotic sounding names for the steps used in the Samba, and the judges will be looking our for volta's and shadow volta's, botafogo's, shadow botafogo's and side-by-side botafogo's. Also expect to see the classic Samba rolls and shadow rolls - the dancers need to be loose and supple to achieve the correct look for these.

The best of Strictly

No perfect scores for the Samba so far in Strictly, but Zoe & Ian were the first to come closest with their joyous routine in Series 3, with an unexpected choice of music. Using the song 'Aquarius' from the musical "Hair", Ian choreographed a brilliant dance full of musicality and bounce, and choosing this as their latin dance for the final, scored 10's from both Len and Bruno with a total score of 38 points. In fact, Zoe was so good at the Samba, she was asked back the next year to perform with the professionals in a demonstration dance. Their score was matched in series 8 by Matt & Aliona with their Vegas inspired routine at the Blackpool Tower Ballroom. Matt had been touted to score a 10 from the beginning of the series, and became the first male celebrity to score a 10 for the samba, actually being awarded two for the routine.

In Series 1, Natasha & Brendan scored the first 10 in Strictly history for their Samba danced to the "Strictly Ballroom" soundtrack song 'Love Is In The Air', but unfortunately, when performing the dance in the series final, Brendan's microphone cable got caught in the beading of Natasha's dress, and they were unable to produce the same level of performance.

The worst of Strictly

It is very difficult to master the Samba because of its changing rhythms and very bouncy feel, and so far it has produced some awful dances over the five series of Strictly, with one of the worst coming from the Jo & Brendan in the seventh series when they danced to "Superstition", despite Brendan trying to choreograph a routine to show Jo to her best advantage, she was off balance and couldn't keep up with the routine, and earning the comment "complete dance disaster" from Craig who awarded them just two points. In the very first series in the shape of Chris & Hanna's routine was danced to the theme from the "Austin Powers" film, and Hanna tried really hard to give Chris something he could enjoy by choosing a modern song, hoping this would improve his dancing, but it was really just plain awful, with little Samba content, meriting just 15 points from the judges.

Ann & Anton scored the lowest score ever for a Samba in series 8 scoring just 13 points, including a 1 from Craig, but it couldn't really be considered a samba as Ann refused to dance a lot of the basic steps, including samba rolls, as they were too suggestive, and for the most part she stood still or walked, and made no attempt to even try to work on the technique of the steps.

Scores for all Samba performances:

*Arlene Phillips judged series one to six, while Alesha Dixon judged series 7 onwards.
**Len Goodman did not judge Series 9 Week 6 and actress Jennifer Grey took his place.