What is Hustle?

Hustle is a social partner dance born in 1970s New York, created by Puerto Rican teenagers in the South Bronx, and shaped through decades of exchange with Black, Latin and queer nightlife culture. It is both a dance form and a cultural story of joy, resistance, and connection.

Friends of the Waterfront Grand Opening, 2025. Shot by @kkhooray.

Where it came from.

Built on rhythm, improvisation, and connection, the dance grew in homes, parks, community centers, and clubs before becoming a global phenomenon. At its heart, Hustle is a conversation between two people and the music. It invites us to listen, trust, play, and move together. Before it lit up dance floors in Manhattan, Hustle was alive in the streets, gyms, and community centers of New York City. A generation of Black and Puerto Rican teenagers created a new form of partner dance that blended Latin dances like Salsa and Mambo with Soul, Funk, and early disco. It wasn't taught formally - it was passed between friends, family, and neighborhood crews. At block parties and school dances, partners would improvise turns, spins, and syncopations that reflected their rhythm, swagger, and spirit. A key figure in the early history is Willie “Marine Boy” Estrada, one of the original pioneers of the Latin Hustle, whose story is told in his book The Dancing Gangsters of the South Bronx: Rise of the Latin Hustle. Estrada and other members of the Imperial Bachelors used the Latin Hustle as a way to bring peace into a violent South Bronx, hosting hustle parties at St. Mary's Recreation Center in 1974.

"Hustle is not only about steps. It's a conversation, an energy, a meeting."

— Abdiel Jacobsen

What it meant.

Hustle wasn't just a trend - it was a form of resistance. At a time when communities of color were being pushed to the margins, young people used dance to reclaim joy, visibility, and real human connection. The Hustle gave people permission to take up space, to move with confidence, to partner with trust even when the world felt unstable.

Disco first emerged in underground Black, Latino, and gay clubs. At the close of the 1960s, it was still illegal for same-sex couples to dance in public in New York City - that changed in 1971, opening the door for people to celebrate on the dance floor in ways that had been denied to them. Hustle was part of that liberation.

"It's more than just a dance for us. It's a way of expressing our life."

— Eddie Torres

How it spread - and what got lost.

Van McCoy and the Soul City Symphony's song “The Hustle” became a hit in 1975, reaching the number one spot on both the Billboard Hot 100 and Hot Soul Singles charts. Two years later, Saturday Night Fever would embed Hustle into the global cultural imagination.

But mainstream exposure came with a cost. Maria Torres, a disco dancer from NYC, described what happened: "The thing which really killed partner dancing was Saturday Night Fever. It was originally an underground dance, done mainly by Hispanics, Blacks, and gays, who could really do partner dancing. They were incredible, but that was an underground thing. Then when Saturday Night Fever came out, the masses flocked to the clubs to experience what they saw in the movie. But what they thought the Hustle was, was freestyle - because that's what John Travolta did."

As with many art forms created by communities of color, Hustle was later commercialized - and its origin story blurred.

Where it is today.

Hustle is described by some as the last authentic American partner dance born and cultivated in the United States. It has never stopped evolving. More than nostalgia, Hustle remains a living language - a dynamic, adaptive, and fiercely joyful expression of New York City's creative spirit. It tells the story of cultures blending, rhythms colliding, and communities rising together on dance floors illuminated by hope, sweat, and soul.

Maria Torres on why this legacy matters now:

The Hustle lives on because we keep moving — as dancers, as storytellers, as guardians of legacy.

So here's my call:

To dancers — learn it. Keep it alive.

To institutions — fund it. Make space for it.

To educators — teach it with context, not just choreography.

"Because Hustle isn't just a dance. It's a legacy. And we owe it to ourselves — and each other — to keep it alive."

— Maria Torres

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