PORTAGE PARK — For Miguel A. Torres Jr., teaching someone to dance is like teaching them to cook.
“You can memorize a recipe, but that doesn’t mean you know how to cook,” Torres said.
That’s why at Torres’ newly opened Windy City Salsa Studio, 4226 N. Milwaukee Ave., he encourages his students to do more than just memorize choreography routines. Instead, he shows them how to move to the music by teaching them patterns and combinations.
“I tell them, ‘This just one ingredient; you put it together however you want,'” Torres said.
Windy City Salsa Studio opened in Portage Park in early March, offering salsa and cha cha classes. In April, Torres will add Cubatón classes, Zumba and intro to Latin dancing classes for teens.
For more than 30 years, teaching and dancing salsa was how Torres let loose. After leaving the insurance industry last year, he decided to take the leap and open a studio.
“No matter where I’ve been, no matter what I’ve done, salsa has always been my constant,” the 44-year-old said.
A Lifelong Dancer
Music was “just always on” in Torres’ childhood home in Portage Park.
Torres’ parents loved to dance, and they even won a few amateur night dance competitions in the 1970s and ’80s, he said.
When Torres was about 13, his father, who was born in Puerto Rico, taught him to salsa. Learning to read the unspoken dynamic between salsa partners helped Torres gain important social skills and build his confidence at a young age, and he now imparts those lessons on his own students, he said.
Torres quickly gained a reputation as a dancer. By high school, he was helping choreograph his friends’ school performances and cotillions at what is now Foreman College and Career Academy.
“I didn’t know what the hell I was doing, but everyone knew I was a dancer and they would just ask me for help,” Torres said.
In Torres’ early 20s, he started taking classes at Latin Street Dancing in the South Loop, where he was recruited to perform in the cabaret show and then to teach a few classes.
Even while Torres worked full-time in insurance, he continued to teach salsa at Latin Street, Chicago Dance Studio and Salsa Cruise.
About a year ago, Torres’ friend who owns the 4226 N. Milwaukee Ave. storefront asked him to consider opening a studio in the vacant space. At first, Torres didn’t want the headache of opening his own business.
“But then I said, ‘You know, Miguel, these types of opportunities don’t come around every day, and what’s going to happen is you are going to be that guy driving past the storefront once a week for the next 20 years,'” Torres said.
Torres signed the lease in January, taught a few trial classes in February and opened in early March.
Torres teaches salsa classes Tuesday and Thursday nights and cha cha classes Thursdays. Starting in April, Maribel Torres (no relation to Miguel Torres) will teach Zumba and intro to Latin dancing classes on Saturday mornings, and Adonis Gonzalez will teach Cubatón classes on Wednesday nights.
Over the next few months, Torres hopes to expand Windy City’s teen offerings and add Kizomba and Cumbia dance classes. He also wants to start hosting monthly weekend socials so beginner dancers have a safe space to try out their moves. The studio is available to rent for dance instruction and special events.
A monthlong session of weekly dance classes at Windy City is $60. People who refer a friend get a $10 discount, as does the friend they refer.
For more information about Windy City Salsa Studio, visit windycitysalseros.com.
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Subscribe to Block Club Chicago, an independent, 501(c)(3), journalist-run newsroom. Every dime we make funds reporting from Chicago’s neighborhoods. Already subscribe? Click here to gift a subscription, or you can support Block Club with a tax-deductible donation.
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