Balboa has two main forms and two timings:

Pure Balboa: In this form, dancers remain with their torsos touching, doing variations based on footwork. Main footwork variations include single-time Balboa, double-time Balboa, and triple-time Balboa.

Bal Swing: In this form, dancers separate their bodies for spins and turns, much like in swing dance, returning to pure Balboa on occasion.

Basic Balboa Timing holds on the four and eight. Break Time Balboa (what some call Willie Desatoff's Style) holds on the three and seven.

Fun ALL LEVELSCLASS with no partner and no experience is needed! Learn the original dance from the 1930’s by dancers who were there and by champions who trained under them. Its romantic closeness, fancy footwork, effortless flow, simplicity and economy of movement make Balboa suited to fast tempo music or slow romantic swaying tunes. Balboa can be danced to songs as slow as Tuxedo Junction or as fast as White Heat! For beginning and intermediate dancers the Balboa Foundation is intended to bring you the core principles and 5 fundamentals! This level is for those dancers who have never taken a dance class, those who are proficient dancers of a different type and style but never taken Balboa, those who have taken Balboa classes and have learned the Basics, those who have taken many Balboa classes over a period of time but have not yet progressed past the 5 fundamentals: the basic, transition, come around, inside turn, back to close. Build on them and build on your own Balboa and Bal-Swing repertoire into a more intermediate level. If you have taken many a class on Balboa but need better technique, this is the class for you (by the second week expect to be challenged)!

Started in the late 1920's to early 1930's by dancers in the Los Angeles area such as Maxie Dorf, Willie Desatoff, Hal Takier and Ann Mills, to mention but a few. The dance was named after Balboa Island in the Newport Beach area which was the location of the Rendezvous Ballroom.