3 years of hype and it finally happened… and it was awesome!

This story starts some time ago, it was late 2021, it was the first year that I travelled so much for festivals, as I went solo to Istambul and Odessa, then took a flight with Yesus to El Sol and Geneva and had a blast in Latin Dance Festival in Barcelona so I had my fair share of festivals and my budget was screaming for help, so I said, «no festivals at the start of the year for me». Yeah, you know how this story always ends.

In Latin Dance Festival, people would not stop telling me to come to Bachata Sensual World Congress, first edition, done by korke &Judith like Made In Cadiz but with an international focus, all teams from the Big Sensual Five were gonna be there… When temptation knocks on the door so loud, it’s so hard to ignore. So yeah, my plans were ruined even before starting 2022. Thankfully, it got cancelled so I didn’t have to ask for a loan or to sell my kidney to go… And it was the second year in a row it was cancelled because of Covid. With such a presentation you can imagine how big the hype was for everyone who got a ticket for this. Full passes were sold out one month ahead of the event and the venue of the festival was going to be one of the best in my opinion, the same one as Latin Dance Festival. So the only remaining question was… Was this festival going to live up to 3 years of smoking hot hype??

Wanna skip to the conclusions? click here

My take on the festival

A Korke & Judith festival, the creators of bachata sensual, always attract the «intellectuals» of the bachata, the people who love Bachata sensual technique and who really wants to get to the next level dancing. Teams from all of the artists were coming to perform, as well as the targeted audience being more international than the Latin Dance Festival means lots of people from all around Europe and outside were coming. Overall, this meant that my expectation for the social dance was incredibly high, expecting all followers to have at least a good understanding of the following technique and a lot of motivation to keep getting better. But on the other hand, I was scared about three things which I will discuss later: Djs, the dance room and no afternoon parties announced (WHY??).

Lastly, I was dumb and I forgot I bought a full pass last year and didn’t get the full pass on time, so I had a party pass at last moment notice, so no classes for me, and usually i just take 3 classes in the whole 3 days (priorities, sir!).

DJs & Lineup

Workshops

This section is not in the scoring criteria on its own and it should be empty but i just wanted to say how people were really adamant in letting me know «oh, party pass, because you are too good for classes, of course». Yeah… please, don’t do that. It’s a mean thing to say and you know zero context to make that kind of statement and it was more than one or two people, including people from the organization… In particular, I will gladly take a private with some of the top couples and a party pass instead of a full pass, as classes are usually just full, you don’t see much and teachers don’t pinpoint particular mistakes or its not such a nice context to ask questions, usually if i have full pass i go to more unknown artist classes, much easier to learn something, but that’s just my take and i think everyone else should feel free to do whatever they want.

Closing on this topic, people who went to classes told me that indeed the big couples were really hard to join their classes because they were filled to the brim. Classes I would have taken would have been from Marc & Marilyn as they seem something different and their demos look quite good, both technique and musicality wise, as well as Pablo & Raquel, as always.

N/A

DJs

Korke&Judith sometimes don’t choose the best Djs… (Dreadfully remembering Evelyn la negra at Made In Cádiz 2022 and chaining 3-4 salsas together in a bachata festival…) So it’s always that i check with skepticism as i go to each of their festival but this time, I was relieved to see Tony & DJ Husky.

They were, as usual, on top of their game, bachata moderna and really according to the vibe created by BSWC so props to them for being so consistent in the performance, they never dissapoint. The other DJs I have to say I didn’t pay much attention, they were ok, but nothing to write home about. Sometimes they got stuck in the same kind of songs and not being able to read the room but not for too long so there are no big complains here, but the real vibe-setters were Dj Tony & Dj Husky for sure.

9/10

Location

I just copy-paste the same as LDF, as it’s the same hotel: The location is NOT Barcelona, this is always the case with BCN events, it’s either Santa Susana or Lloret, and unlike Santa Susana which, let’s be honest, the hotel is quite awful, this one it’s worth the trip. But plan it, there are certain shuttles going from BCN airport and Barcelona Nord but there are not many and of course they run out of seats because everyone of the festival takes them. If you don’t take them you are stuck with more than 2 hours of bus and transfers so really plan your flight/trip ahead of time and taking this shuttle transfer into account(Yeah, first hand experience :D) . You can check in either https://compras.moventis.es/online/ or in the festival page for shuttles from airport and BCN.

7/10

Venue

As before, the venue is the same, but i won’t copy paste because I don’t feel like the vibes set were the same. In this hotel organizers have freedom to do whatever they want(come on, in the last one an empty pool party, who allows that?), but i felt like this was not exploited at all, the thing that bothered me the most is that ok, this is a korke&Judith festival and classes and keeping getting formation is the prime target but reality is that festivals so big people also want to have fun, and there were no afternoon parties announced for this festival. How is that possible? with such a nice setup, they have at least 4 big halls where they can do social dancing, without taking into account the outside pool or the parking, how is it possible no afternoon parties? On the other hand, they really listened to this concern and even if it was unplanned or just a popular demand that they tried to fulfill last moment, they organized it and I knew it because word of mouth(or word of Whatsapp), not because it was announced. The takeaway is that I think this amazing venue was not as exploited as it could, not taking advantage of the facility like the latin had, and not setting the vibe as much as it could, maybe because focusing too much in the classes. Having said that, i will copy paste the information that I think is useful nonetheless:

It is a HUGE venue, 4 different hotels mean that you will be lost the first 2 days until you get used to it, there are 3 different restaurants depending on where you sleep and as we said, it seems like you need to be lucky to get the good hotel. The rooms are quite different, they go from 2 huge king size bed WITH another room for a sofa to… not enough space to open your luggage. This time(BSWC) we got the smallest rooms , but all of us did so at least we were pretty close

And thirdly, even though the venue is impressive, as you know from Latin Dance Festival , that venue is appropiate for a 50-50 salsa-bachata festival because it has 2 rooms, one big for bachata and another with the stage but less space for salsa. In this case, as both rooms were mainly bachata and the main room where the artists are usually in, and the closest to the entrance, it’s the small room, it was impossible to dance here, and the second one needs better ventilation, at some point the floor started being slippery because of the condensation…

8/10

Vibes

So when you have the chance to go to many festivals you can see how the people who run it influence who is the people coming and what is the vibe set for the festival. To put it simple, in Esencia Festivals you are going to see a lot of Marco & Sara fans coming around. For Bachata Sensual Festivals, a lot of Korke & Judith fans will be present. And when i say fan I mean it in a different way for each one. Usually fans of the latter, are obssesed with a good social dance, perfecting the technique, and less showy. More like salsa fans in festivals. Respecting the artist but mainly i think there is admiration for the teacher and the teaching way. The same way, in Marco & Sara festivals i expect to see a lot more camera and drama whereas in K&J festival they even soft-ban the use of cameras in the social dancing(Sensual Week Cadiz).

That’s the vibe set in this festival, lots of knowledge seekers, maybe too intellectual at times and personally i would have loved to spend some time having dinner with some people to get to know them better as it felt as in the dance floor everyone was seeking the next dance to not miss out on any good dancer so less emotional connections. But i have to say intellectual totally works for me, talking for hours about minuscule details on leading and following or discussing how some zouk technique is very similar to bachata sensual, it is totally my vibe, but please, for it to be a 10, afternoon parties need to be announced from the get-go! Give them the importance they need! Almost everyone i talked to loved them more than the nights.

Organization

In one word, i would say bittersweet, because on one hand, how are you organizing a festival and you are not doing afternoon parties or at least don’t announce them?(you can feel how important this is to me by now, it’s like the fourth time i mention). I always think best ambient is there, and if you don’t know yet and are curious about my criteria, you can check it here.

On the other hand, when they knew or when someone told them: «Hey, guys, you cannot NOT have an afternoon party» they did it and for me those parties were the highlight of the event so props to them for being able to easily adapt in such a huge festival. Check-in was smooth, and they have good adaptations details, like sending the artists to the room with less people so people distribute more evenly within the two rooms.

8/10

Price

Party pass went out for 40e, and full pass between 90-110€, which for the huge lineup there was and the DJs, was nice, but maybe the full pass it’s a bit pricey because only 3 days of festival, compared to others in lloret, it’s lacking one day, and i think they could get away with it, lots of people stayed the next week as well. The rooms apply the same, for lloret we paid 215 each for 4 nights Full board. This time the price was almost the same for only 3 nights(only one month apart and both events in low season, Dec-Jan)

8/10

9/10

Dance Level

As one of the biggest bachata nerds there is out there, this festival is a must stop if you enjoy smooth dances with amazing technique, maybe lacking in other areas like passion or musicality, but really delicious in terms of enjoying the sensitivity of the following of the best followers around the world. And very international, this is one of the main attractive points to come to this festival.

9.5/10

Conclusion

Have this festival live up to the hype after 3 years? absolutely, this is a must-stop for any fan of Bachata Sensual (Korke&Judith, Pablo & Raquel and the likes). In any case, be prepared for some salsa, between 5 to 25% depending on the room you choose.

A little bit on the expensive side regarding other festivals in same locations but the difference in social dancing totally makes up for it, so you better check the passes for next year! 🙂

If you are a dance freak obssessed with technique, getting better, practicing and learning, this bumps even higher, as even if you dont take that many classes you will find people just like you around every corner, and there are a lot of corners in this huge resort!

The final score for this festival is…

8.5/10

This has been the review for the Bachata Sensual World Congress 2023, if you were there and think i missed on something or you are curious about going next year, feel free to leave me a comment in the post or my social media.

Until next time, thanks for reading,

César.