Merengue music evolved from Dominican folk music to become an infectious, mambo-inspired genre, inextricably bound to the merengue dance.
While the basic rhythm– 1-2, 1-2 — inspires the dancer to march, the real magic of merengue comes in the ways dancer keep constantly moving their hips. The Dominican Republic’s “Generalissimo” Rafael Trujillo, an avid merengue dancer who, once of humble origins, had been barred from elite dance clubs, declared merengue music as the music of the people and forcefully required urban dance bands to include it in their shows. Watch this video and dance along.
