1) samba basic steps - She teaches front foot samba, side to side samba and going back first samba. She teaches it first without music and counts for you. This is excellent as you can get the count and the sway of the hips. I have been doing Brazilian dance for years and this is the first time I had someone break it down with precision. She then teaches it with music and at half time and regular time.
2) workout tutorials - She breaks down the workouts (1-4) at half time.
3) Transition samba steps - These are steps you will do between the workouts to keep your heart rate up.
Next is the warm-up. If you have ever taken a dance class, the warm-up will be familar to you. It is a slow warm-up, not very exciting but it gets the job done which is to warm up the muscles.
Then there is the workout which is broken into 4 sections. She does each one slow then up to tempo with a transition step in between each workout. The workouts are on separate chapters in the event you need to repeat one. The steps are not complicated but are fast and challenging as you will be changing directions and turning. I suggest that you have a pretty large dancing space. The last section, 5, is all of the workouts strung together w/o the transition steps at warp speed (up to tempo).
For my first time through I got about 1/2 the steps up to tempo. The samba is very fast and tiring. I sweated up a storm!!! Unless you are in excellent shape and/or a sambanista, you will not get this at tempo the first time around. That's good because this DVD challenges you so that each time you do it you get a little bit more and a little bit stronger.
The last section is a short but sweet cool down.
Quenia is joined by 3 dancers 2 of whom were on her last DVD. The setting is a sound stage with hard wood floors. (not good on thick pile carpet) The music is very good BUT could have been a little louder. Thankfully, once the workout starts she doesn't talk a lot except to cue you.
Over all I loved this DVD and will do it again and again and one today I hope to be able to do part 5 straight thru without stopping. And since workout 5 is its own chapter, you can put your DVD player on repeat and do it several times as you become stronger. I must say that I had the privilege of taking her class at the Alvin Ailey dance school in NYC and she is the sweetest person and a petite dynamo. Obrigada Quenia
