Legend has it that one Enrique Jorrin, a Cuban big-band leader in New York invented it. He was watching the dancers and noticed the sounds their feet made; they produced a "shar-shar" noise as their feet moved across the ballroom floor. Inspired, Enrique left at the end of the night and returned the next night with a brand new rhythm, which he tried out on the dancers. The response was incredible, and the chachacha went on to take the world by storm. This was the early 1950s.

It's a romantic anecdote, and apart from any inaccuracies, it does say a little something about dancing then as it is today. Dancers and musicians interacted a lot more then, perhaps it's because we don't dance to live music as often now.

The chachacha is a mid-tempo rhythm; faster than the bolero and slower than the mambo. But all three of them (and including salsa) are members of the same family called the son rhythm group. They all have four beat patterns, share an accent on the second beat, and obey the son clave. While not as romantic as its slower sibling, and not as frenetic as its quicker ones, I feel that the chachacha is the true rogue of the family. The chachacha has a cheeky combination of quick and slow pulses, giving it a kind of tension and dynamism that really is something special.

"So, how's it danced?" I hear you clamour. "That all depends," I reply. Some people would argue that the International Latin American version would be accurate. After all, it has changed little in structure since it was documented. While it is still true to the form, in that it is danced on the second beat because of the accent, it is too heavily stylised and sanitised for today's club environment. I recommend dancing your favourite version of salsa to chachacha music, replacing the third step with two smaller quicker steps followed by a slower one (known as cha-cha-chas).

As for which beat to dance it on, there are innumerable discussions on whether to dance it on beats one or two. To be rhythmically accurate, it should be on beat two. That way the cha-cha-chas would fall on the proper part of the rhythm (which is what Enrique Jorrin probably intended). Having said that, it's much easier for people to learn dancing on beat one. And as a well-known dance teacher once told me, "what's easier, sells". There is very little point in sticking slavishly to dancing on two if it causes the form to die out. So when faced with a decision between one and the other, have both! I dance on one with less experienced dancers and on two with the more experienced ones.

The chachacha rhythm is still here in the present day. A little like a film star whom you recognise but no-one else around you does. Its musicians the like of Willie Colón, Fulanito, Illegales, Sergio George, Jarabe de Palo, and Carlos Santana who have kept it very much alive.

It was Carlos Santana's comeback album "Supernatural" containing three chachachas, and particularly the track "Smooth" that served the compulsion to write about this not-so-forgotten rhythm. The same track sold more than fourteen million copies and earned him a Grammy.

To be appreciated by so many, and to be recognised by so few... How chic is that?