At Midtown Dance, you don’t need a ticket, a reservation, or dance experience. You just need to show up.
Every Wednesday evening this spring and early summer, Greeley Square Park in Midtown Manhattan becomes a free, open-air classroom for some of the most powerful dance traditions in the African diaspora — from Haitian roots movement to Puerto Rican Bomba, Afro-Brazilian dance, and pan-Caribbean social styles.
Presented by the 34th Street Partnership, the 2026 edition may be its most culturally rich yet.
Midtown Dance is a free weekly outdoor dance program held at Greeley Square Park (Broadway between 32nd and 33rd Streets, below Herald Square). Classes run one hour and are open to everyone — beginners, experienced dancers, tourists, and locals alike. Instructors are seasoned professionals who guide participants through both technique and cultural context.
The series is hosted by Talia Castro-Pozo, with select events hosted by Big Apple Ranch, K-pulse NYC, and Masala Bhangra. Throughout the season, styles rotate across Latin, ballroom, hip hop, Afro, and K-pop — but the 2026 Afro Dance series (May through June) is where the African and Latin roots of the Americas take center stage.
Admission is always FREE. No registration required.
Midtown Dance 2026 Lineup
This season is very Afro. My biggest lesson from studying Latin culture for over 20 years is how African our cultural origins are. That is equally true for American culture as it is for Latin culture. Today’s global youth culture is African Diasporic culture in the Caribbean and Latin America, but ultimately, from Mother Africa.
Come see how much fun we are having.
Afro Dance 🌍
The series opens with a broad introduction to Afro dance — movement traditions rooted in West and Central African cultures that traveled across the Atlantic and became the foundation for virtually every dance form in the Americas
Wednesday, May 20, 6-7pm, FREE
Haitian Dance 🇭🇹
Haiti holds a singular place in world history as the first Black republic and the site of the only successful slave revolution in modern history. Haitian dance is inseparable from Vodou ceremony and spiritual practice — the movements carry memory, resistance, and identity across generations. This class dives into that living tradition.
Wednesday, May 27, 6-7pm, FREE
Afro Brazilian Dance 🇧🇷
Brazil received more enslaved Africans than any other country in the Americas — over 4 million people across three centuries. The movement traditions they preserved and transformed became the foundation of Brazilian culture: Candomblé ceremony, capoeira, samba, and the styles explored in this class. Afro-Brazilian dance is survival expressed through the body.
Wednesday, June 3, 6-7pm, FREE
Puerto Rican Bomba Dance 🇵🇷
Bomba is one of the most vital expressions of African identity in the Spanish Caribbean. Born among enslaved and free Africans on Puerto Rico’s sugar plantations in the 17th century, it is a conversation between dancer and drummer — the dancer leads, the drummer follows, and together they create something unrepeatable. Bomba is not a relic; it is alive and evolving, and New York’s Puerto Rican community has been central to keeping it that way.
Bomba’s iconic image is the woman’s play with her bomba skirt. Many Latin cultures have similar forms. Today the skirt can be a scarf, or even just your hands. But men dance too. And their dancing is equally amazing. The movements are simple and easy to learn. ¡Bombazo!
Wednesday, June 10, 6-7pm, FREE
Afro Caribbean Dance 🇨🇺 🇯🇲 🇲🇶 🇹🇹
The Caribbean is where Africa, Europe, and the indigenous Americas collided, merged, and created entirely new cultures. This class draws from the broad spectrum of Afro-Caribbean movement — from Cuba to Trinidad, Jamaica to Martinique — honoring the shared African roots that pulse beneath the surface of Caribbean life.
Wednesday, June 17, 6-7pm, FREE
African Social Dance
The series closes by returning to the source: social dance from the African continent itself. This is the well from which everything else in this series — and in so much of Latin and Caribbean culture — was drawn. A joyful, communal celebration of where it all began.
Wednesday, June 24, 6-7pm, FREE