10/08/2026
What is Bachata and who decides, and defines what Bachata is, and what Bachata is not?
Bachata music and dance is from Dominican Republic. It belongs to Dominican culture and the Dominican people. Only the people from that culture and from that island, who are not selling out the culture to the highest financial bidder, should be deciding what can be classified and defined as Bachata.
Bachata is more than just a dance in the social dance scene. It's an identity for a lot of people in Dominican Republic!
If your goal is make more money and have bigger events in the congress / festival dance world, then sure, put them all together and throw the next big MIXED (fake) "BACHATA" festival! But let's try not to bypass the history of a cultural dance and music under the disquise of creating a more inclusive dance communitv that erases and strips Bachata of her true identity and essence.
At the end of the day, BACHATA IS BACHATA! Let all those other DANCE GENRES (not Bachata styles) create their own path and be pushed by the pioneers who created them.
The above message includes excerpts from a comment by Brandon Bachata on Samy Magico's post that called for Bachata to be defined /redefined to accommodate dance genres that want to be recognized as Bachata (styles) when they are not styles of Bachata. The only different STYLES of Bachata are Dominican: Bonao style, Barahona style, Santiago style, Santo Domingo style, Las Terrenas style etc.
✨️The last two images in this post were created by The Bachata Crew.
