Over a year ago StuckOnSalsa and Caribbean Breeze in Arlington was hot , but due the owner's decision to change the music format , the salsa nights no longer exist. That's the funny thing about Salsa promotions you never know when a place will shut down . The owner felt that the salsero crowd was not buying enough drinks and he wanted to go in another direction.
I have no idea what the crowd is like now on a Friday night but I get the word from my sources. Let's just say this the crowd is nothing like when Caribbean Breeze was one of the hottest salsa places to go on a Friday night . Here is an article that the Washington Post published on Caribbean Breeze a year and a half ago
Here, Salsa Dancing Is a Breeze
By Fritz Hahn
Special to The Washington Post
Friday, May 26, 2006; Page WE05
Just as Wednesday happy hour is winding down, Caribbean Breeze begins to heat up. From 4 to 7, the Ballston restaurant's cherry-stained bar is the domain of office workers in suits and ties who sit around the U-shaped counter enjoying one of the neighborhood's best happy hours, with $2 beers, $3 appetizers and $5 mojitos. But as the clock ticks toward the end of the deals, Latin music begins to play on the far side of the room, and instructors Earl Rush and Maribel Soto begin to lead a group of would-be salseros through the basics of the dance: foundation steps, simple turns, how to lead and follow. Heads at the bar invariably swivel to see what's going on and even nod to the music.
Rush and Soto spend two hours working with a dozen or more students, who pay $10 each for the drop-in classes, and after the lessons are over, the instructors hang around to offer tips and private advice while students practice the moves they've learned. After all, they need to be ready for Friday's main event, when as many as 150 people pack the restaurant to hear DJ Andy spin salsa music.
After the Friday dinner rush subsides, tables are removed from a large portion of the restaurant -- the area with the hardwood floor between the bar and the doors to the huge patio -- and the makeshift dance floor becomes among the liveliest I've seen recently.
What really sets it apart, though, is the music. "It's a salsa night," Rush says. "Listen. There's no bachata , no merengue. If you're a hard-core salsero, it's hard to find that. Everyone else is playing reggaeton or something. I just wanted to do a night with salsa."
Rush began hosting Caribbean Breeze's Fridays in January. After spending a few years working at other people's events, he wanted to do something on his own. "We'd known about Caribbean Breeze, so we approached the owner, and he gave us six weeks to try it. I thought if we could make it through January, in the winter, then the summer will be easy."
Crowds did turn up, and though newcomers were asking about lessons, Rush says he couldn't offer them. "On Fridays, we don't have the time," he says. "The restaurant is doing good business, so we go from 10 to 2. If you try to put a lesson in there, you only have three hours to party." Two months ago, Rush began teaching beginner and advanced-beginner lessons Wednesdays from 7 to 9, focusing on the traditional "on 1" salsa as well as the New York style, known as "on 2."
Fridays have gone so well that, beginning this weekend, Caribbean Breeze is expanding its offerings to Saturday night, with a new Latin night that encompasses more than salsa; the patio, for example, will be a "Bolero Courtyard" with romantic music.
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