03.10.10
Posted in Flamenco at 12:57 AM by Administrator
Dancers display Adela's latest creation to the rhythm of the tanguillo
Tonight at the Peña Los Cernicalos, calle Sancho Vizcaino 25, locals and foreigners alike were treated to a very interesting show which hopefully will become an annual event. Local flamenco dress designer Adela Olmos, with the collaboration of a number of foreign dance students representing Mexico, Brasil, Spain, France, Italy and Japan, staged a unique fashion show to highlight her creations. Counting on the assistance of local talents such as Domingo Rubichi and El Bizco de los Camarones, these ladies graced the stage of Los Cernicalos to the tune of the tanguillo, alegrias, soleares, and siguiriyas, sporting Adela’s lovely hand made flamenco fashions. As someone quite ignorant of the fashion world, but firmly entrenched in the flamenco, I found the idea to be original and highly creative, carried off with a great measure of class both on the part of the foreigners who were obviously trying their best to impress a large local crowd (and not easy to do in such a discriminating place such as Jerez) as well as the local musicians, who accompanied this unusual choreography with great skill. I’m not one to embrace unorthodox flamenco experiments lightly, but I found the evening a refreshing change from the standard peña format and a wonderful opportunity for some of these women who have been studying in Jerez for years and yet do not often get the opportunity to perform in public with skilled musicians. Enhorabuena chicas, y enhorabuena Adela!
Peña Los Cernicalos saw the presentation of interesting dress designs sported by talented foreign dance students
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03.03.10
Posted in Flamenco at 3:31 AM by Administrator
You can always tell when Festival time has hit Jerez, as in the space of one minute walking across the Plaza Arenal you hear French, German, Japanese and Italian, usually in that order. Everywhere you look there are faces, some foreign, some more familiar (having been coming to festivals for years)…random groups going over dance steps in the street, or taking photographs of the charming city center. It is as international as it gets in Jerez, and it comes but two weeks a year.
A flamenco performance from some years ago, with the recently deceased Fernando Terremoto, in the old peña Tio José de Paula
This evening, my destination was the Peña Tio José de Paula on calle Merced, the city’s most accesible flamenco peña in Barrio Santiago. Peña Tio José de Paula used to be a tiny, claustrophobic, but packed with duende kind of place that oozed charm. Some of the best flamenco I’ve ever seen has been in this peña, and part of its history shares my history as I grew in the flamenco world…I’ll always remember the flamenco cante course taught there every November, under the guidance of José Vargas “El Mono de Jerez” or the cante of Fernando “Terremoto” (son), two legendary artists who sadly were taken away at an early age.
The cante course still takes place every year and superb artists grace a new stage and a new building, right next door to the old one. I suppose it was time for some updating, but I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to the new Tio José de Paula.
My visiting this evening was to see a curious group, referred to as “Las Mujeres de la Peña Tio José de Paula”, performing as part of the “de peña en peña” series of late night concerts during the festival. A group of ladies of advanced age and yet still very young at heart, none of whom were professional musicians or singers or dancers and yet who had something everyone in the room that night could learn from with their lively cante and baile, assisted by the guitar of Domingo Rubichi. Many of these ladies are mothers, sisters, or other relatives of some of the best known talent to come out of the gypsy neighborhood of Santiago. They belong to a generation raised before there were flamenco peñas in Jerez, and flamenco was something that took place in a fiesta, or the private patio of a family’s home, but never as a paid public spectacle.
One of the "mujeres" of the group of the Tio José de Paula Peña
The ladies have been performing as a group for some years now, and this certainly wasn’t the first time I saw them so I wasn’t expecting to be blown away…and for the most part, I wasn’t. However, their sense of compass and style could not help but have me tapping along to the rhythm…and that’s the thing about these “mujeres”….they’re not re-inventing the wheel. They are showing you that when you’ve been born and lived your entire life within this music…you don’t have to.
Crisp, perfectly synchopated clapping rhythms joined with the elegant and simple falsetas of Rubichi provided a solid base with which each of these 10 women took their turn to sing a letra (verse) or do a ‘pataita por bulerias’, the colloquial term for dancing a short number in the bulerias style. Simple, and yet loaded with compas that even seasoned foreigners find difficult to follow at first.
Watching them reminded me of something an old guitar teacher of mine said once. “Musicians have it all wrong. The hard stuff is easy. It’s the easy stuff that’s hard to do, and do right.”
The next peña performance is tomorrow night, at the Peña la Buleria here in Barrio San Miguel, at 1 a.m.
P.S. I started noticing parked vans and the added cameras in recent peña performances, and tonight learned about “CanalFlamencotv”, an initiative by Onda Jerez Television to provide Flamenco oriented conent on their website, which began last year. They will be adding clips from most Festival events throughout the week, and are a source for finding videos on flamenco happening in Jerez throughout the year. Or you can pinch here for some slightly less professional images.
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03.02.10
Posted in Flamenco at 3:42 AM by Administrator
Macarena Ramirez at the Peña Alconchel
Beginning at 1 in the morning, Macarena Ramirez performed at the Tertulia Flamena Pepe Alconchel in the Pago San José neighborhood of Jerez. She’s a young and up and coming dancer who, among other things, had a role as a young Lola Flores in the 2007 Spanish film, “Lola”. You can see a short clip of her “Farruca” here.
Her baile was accompanied by cantaor David Carpio (who also performed last Friday in the Peña La Buleria), and the toque of Pascual de Lorca. It was a fairly subdued atmosphere, with the requisite mix of foreigners and locals, but the fact that tomorrow is a work (or in the case of festival attendees, school) day, there wasn’t quite the crowd one would expect.
Bar Colmao on calle Arcos, the hot spot in Jerez for late night Flamenco
I left a little ahead of everyone else and decided I’d try to swing by El Colmao and see if there were any Farruquito sightings to be had (he performed tonight at Teatro Villamarta). El Colmao is the bar on calle Arcos run by Carlos Grilo (yes, bailaor Joaquin Grilo‘s brother) which over the years has become THE place to go for late-night Festival juergas. Anyway, no such luck. And what with many more days of Festival to go, I decided to pack it in early (2 a.m.).
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02.26.10
Posted in Flamenco, Jerez, Cadiz, Spain at 1:38 AM by Administrator
The rain has returned to Jerez.
One of the many intense moments captured by Miguel Angel Gonzalez
For those of you living outside la peninsula iberica, the rains have been so constant over the last several months that the Guadalete river has flooded the plains on the outskirts of town…twice, even making national news because of the severity of the flooding.
So when I saw this evening that the rain was letting up, I thought it a good time to go for a stroll downtown. And I had a destination, Teatro Villamarta, where at 20:00 this evening a photo exhibit on the Festival de Flamenco was being inaugurated. A selection of photographs taken by Diario de Jerez‘s photographer Miguel Angel Gonzalez covering the Festival over the years now occupies a special place, the entrance hall of the theatre, for all festival attendees to see, until the 14th of March. Although the collection is rather small the images captured in Gonzalez’s lens are nonetheless striking, including images of local talents Joaquin Grilo (who was in attendance for the inauguration), Maria del Mar Moreno, or Angelita Gomez during some of their finest performances for Jerez’s most international flamenco event.
My upstairs neighbor, Oxford artist and flamenco dancer Amarita Vargas (the current resident at the Riad) showed up to my surprise and together we helped empty the barrel of fino from the Gonzalez Byass bodega that had been brought in just for the occassion (this being Jerez after all) with the expert hands of a venenciador (a pourer of
No inaugural event in Jerez would be complete without a venenciador displaying his pouring skills
sherry, using a long wand with a narrow cup at the end called a venencia).
We also were fortunate enough to run into Ana Mari Lopez, Jerez’s prized flamenco dance teacher (classes take place down the street from my house at the Peña Los Cernicalos), and over another glass of fino chatted about this year’s edition of the festival. As usual, Ana Mari will be teaching classes at capacity, given the large number of festival attendees who also seek out her brilliant dance lessons.
As the crowd at Villamarta began to thin out, Amarita suggested another exhibit which was taking place across town, this time the paintings of Diana Gallardo. She was inaugurating her exhibit dedicated to Jerez’s most famous daughter, Lola Flores, which runs until the 14th of March in the Sala Compañia (Plaza Compañia). The paintings are lovely and this young artist manages in several occassions to capture the dark beauty of “La Faraona” as she was known. The leaflet being passed out at the exhibition begins in Lola Flores’ own words, as told to Juan Ignacia Garcia-Garzon from “Biografias Vivas
Amarita and Ana Mari Lopez, at Villamarta
ABC”:
“I was born on the 21 of January 250 centuries ago in Jerez de la Frontera. My mother gave birth to me in a room of our house, number 45 on Calle Sol. Very close to the Yedra Chapel and next to the ‘Christ of the Expiration’, I was born on a Sunday at 12 sharp in the morning. Downstairs, my father had a bar which was called “La Fe de Pedro Flores” and there were customers who had an accordion, while I was being born they played the “Royal March”. Here, in this neighborhood [San Miguel] the soul of art began to awaken in me. Here I heard the best voices singing solea, siguiriyas, fandangos and bulerias, and that rhythm from here, from Jerez, which is found no where else, a special rhythm. You can’t learn it, that you carry in your blood, in your genes…”
What made the exhibition all the more fun was the obvious flamenco atmosphere in the Sala Compañia…many of the attendees were local gypsies, Gallardo herself being from the nearby neighborhood of Santiago. While admiring the paintings I spotted two women who were clapping flamenco
Diana Gallardo's paintings on Lola are on display until the 14th of March at the Sala Compañia
rhthyms to the wonderment of a small child who was in his father’s arms….here in Jerez, the rhythms of flamenco are introduced at a very early age!
And of course, it would have been rude not to accept a glass of Solera 1847, a cream sherry from the Gonzalez Byass bodega.
In all, a very pleasant evening, and a fine runner up to the festivities that will begin on Friday, February 26, with the performance by the Ballet Flamenco de Andalucia, beginning at 21:00 in Teatro Villamarta.
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02.23.10
Posted in Flamenco at 10:22 PM by Administrator
I was contacted by an old friend yesterday with a beautiful flamenco track he had just finished recording. José Manuel Alconchel Ortega has been a good friend of mine from Jerez for almost 10 years now. I had first met him when he was still a teen-ager and with time, given that the flamenco scene in Jerez is small (yet packed with punch!) we became close friends.
One of my best summers ever was taking José Manuel back to my native Colorado to play gigs. That trip began disastrously when on our third day in Denver, someone broke into our car and stole the two Valeriano Bernal guitars we had brought for our performances (luckily, the thieves figured the cajón was worthless and left it in the trunk). With the help of some wonderful people in the Boulder area, particularly the brilliant and versatile musician Steve Mullins (who put together an excellent 9 track recording of José Manuel and I for free), we were able to get guitars rushed to us from Valeriano’s studio in Algodonales and performed in the Denver-Boulder area over the next two months.
The rest of that summer is a story for another time, however towards the end of our stay we did see our performances cut short by the terrible tragedy of 9/11. Overnight our aspirations to continue returning to the States to perform regularly disappeared and José Manuel and I packed it up for Jerez, leaving a country that I knew from that day had changed forever.
José Manuel is the son of Pepe Alconchel, a well known flamenco singer from Arcos de la Frontera with a flamenco peña dedicated in his name in the Pago San José in Jerez. He began playing guitar at the age of 9 under the tutelage of Manuel Lozano “El Carbonero” and José Luis Balao. He later studied with Gerardo Nuñez and Manolo Sanlucar.
José Manuel’s career has taken him performing with top artists in the flamenco scene to China, Venezuela, Switzerland, the UK, USA, France, as well as performing all over Andalucia’s flamenco peñas, often accompanying his father who went on to win numerous prizes and awards for cante.
José Manuel is currently in Tenerife, but is getting the itch to travel again. I’m with him there! For worldwide bookings, contact info@houseinjerez.com
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02.22.10
Posted in Flamenco at 11:04 PM by Administrator
The Festival de Jerez 2010 celebrates its 14th edition
With the festival only four days away, I thought I’d dedicate this space to talk about the performances to look out for in this year’s edition, which runs from February 26 to March 13. This year I also plan on blogging on events around the Festival, fotos, videos etc. so keep checking back!
One of the first performances of interest will be that of María José Franco, and her show entitled “Al Compás del Viento”. Although this is not the first time María José is performing in the festival (she’s been in the dance company of Antonio “El Pipa” for years) this will be the first time she is onstage in Teatro Villamarta, the main venue, with a production of her own. She’ll be well supported by guitarists Juan Manuel Moneo and Pedro Pimentel, along with the cante of Luis Moneo, Juan José Amador, as well as a guest performance from Carmen Grilo. This performance takes place Saturday, February 27 at 21:00 at Teatro Villamarta.
Sunday, February 28 will feature two interesting performances, one notable for the youth of the performers and the other a veteran of the cante from Cadiz. Bailaora Carmen Herrera will be sharing the venue with the dancer from Huelva María Canea. Carmen, the prodigy of the widely recognized dance teacher Ana Marí Lopez, has seen her career advance in leaps and bounds, participating among others in the dance company of Mercedes Ruiz. She will also have the support of Mercedes’ guitarist, the virtuoso Santiago Lara, as well as the cante of José Carpio “Mijita”, Miguel “Labi” and Migue Peña “El Londro”. With this kind of cuadro, sparks are bound to fly! Concert takes place at the Sala Compañía (plaza Compañía) at 19:00. Later that evening, at the Bodega Los Apóstoles at midnight, the cante of David Palomar and Mariana Cornejo, both from Cadiz. I’ve seen Mariana numerous times over the years and her cante and style are infectious. A well balanced ticket!
March 1st, at 19:00 in the Palacio Villavicencio (in the Alcázar) is without doubt for me the best bet for the night. Jesús Méndez will be singing with the accompaniment of Moraíto (although it is unclear from the official publication who exactly we are talking about, whether it is Moraíto Chico or another relative, but chances are good that the toque will be fantastic!). I was in the audience in the Peña Don Antonio Chacón in 2002 when this young man went public for the first time, dazzling the crowd with the power of his voice. At times cited as the musical successor to La Paquera de Jerez, his career is the one to follow, as he carries his style so typical of La Plazuela and the San Miguel neighborhood around the world. Hearing Jesús perform gives faith to the listener that flamenco will continue to be alive and well into the next generation.
Tuesday, March 2 will see a performance by a master, Matilde Corral, a point of reference in the Seville school of flamenco dance. The venue will be intimate, taking place at the Centro Andaluz de Flamenco (plaza San Juan), and admission is free! A precious opportunity to attend the performance of a legend. Concert begins at 17:00. Also on Tuesday, the performance of María Bermudez guarantees to deliver. María, who originally hails from Los Angeles, has lived in Jerez for many years and has taken the sounds and art of Jerez to stages world-wide. Her latest creation “Chicana Gypsy Project”, guarantees to surprise with its originality and creativity, bringing together her two worlds. Having the cante of Miguel Flores “El Capullo de Jerez” and the mastery of guitarist Jesús Álvarez, as well as numerous backing musicians, makes this performance one to look out for. Sala Paúl (calle Paúl) at 21:00.
This overview is not meant to be a complete profile of all performances during the XIV Festival, simply some of the performances I plan on attending and which I think stand out. As is the case with Friday, March 5th, when guitarist and teacher José Luis Balao will be performing at the Sala Compañía at 17:00. José Luis has been a teacher for decades and some of the best guitarists in the flamenco world to have come from Jerez and environs have passed through his door. I look forward to attending this rare performance.
Saturday, March 6th at midnight in the Bodega de Los Apóstoles, Juana la del Pipa, Dolores Agujeta and la Macanita will perform in a concert entitled, “Mujerez”. All three are moving cantaoras in their own right, and this well supported performance (including among others the guitar of Moraíto as well as the superb palmas of “El Bo” and “Chicharrito”) stands out among the offering this year.
Joaquin “El Grilo” is a bailaor I’ve seen numerous times over the years and am never tired of his style. He returns to the Festival with his work, “Leyenda Personal”. One of the top flamenco dancers in the world and we are lucky in Jerez to call him one of our own. Sunday, March 7 at 21:00 in Teatro Villamarta.
“Londro” comes to the Palacio Villavicencio on Monday, March 8 at 19:00. He’s a noteworthy cantaor who has performed for years in the dance company of Mercedes Ruiz, among others although his career has included collaborations with Gerardo Nuñez, Carmen Cortes, José Mercé, etc. He’ll appear with the toque of Mercedes’ guitarist Santiago Lara, with whom he has collaborated on Santi’s recent solo album “Sendero de lo Imposible”, and who appears on the solo effort he is currently producing, “Luna de Enero”.
Friday the 12th of March will see two promising concerts, that of dancer Rafael Campallo in Teatro Villamarta at 21:00, as well as a performance by the Los Delinqüentes at midnight in the Sala Paúl. It is interesting to see the latter included in the program as their music is not exactly flamenco, although it is certainly very inspired and band members Diego Pozo and “El Canijo” are in spirt anyway, as flamenco as they come, and they will be joined by Tomasito, who brings rap and funk into the flamenco world in a way that only a gypsy from Jerez could. Should be highly entertaining and a refreshing break from the typical “cante, baile y toque”.
And what will hopefully put a brilliant end to this year’s edition of the Festival de Jerez, a performance by two veterans, two ambassadors if you will of the yin-yang of the Jerez flamenco scene, Barrio Santiago and Barrio San Miguel. Fernando de la Morena and Juan Moneo “El Torta” will bring their signature cante styles to the Bodega los Apóstoles on March 13 at midnight.
Looking forward to enjoying the rich offering of the XIV edition of this year’s Festival, and sharing it with flamenco aficionados spread out in the blogosphere. Bookmark this page and check back!
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02.14.10
Posted in Flamenco at 12:19 AM by Administrator
Fernando "Terremoto" performing a bulerias in the peña Tio José de Paula in Jerez
One only had to hear the first few seconds of Fernando Fernandez Pantoja, “El Terremoto” (“the Earthquake”) singing to understand why he got his stage name.
I was recently arrived to Jerez and the flamenco scene in 1997 when I heard Terremoto perform at a flamenco peña. Terremoto came from a large a prestigious gypsy family from Jerez, and was the son of the original “Terremoto”, a flamenco cantaor who died in 1981, who is still spoken of in the flamenco world with reverence for his tremendous voice and prowess.
Even as a flamenco novice I was completely mesmerised by Fernando Terremoto’s voice, and was acutely aware that I was in the presence of a master. He could, in the course of interpreting a flamenco style, make his voice go from the sound of thunder to the merest whisper, sustaining a note with a melisma so common in flamenco style cante but executed perfectly. There was no question as to whether or not hearing Terremoto’s voice would give you goose bumps. The question was just how many times over.
Terremoto, who just a year before I first saw him perform had won first prize for cante in the Biennal de Sevilla, became a regular fixture in the flamenco peña scene in Jerez. It was particularly gratifying for me when, taking visiting friends to see flamenco for the first time, we were fortunate enough to see him perform, to have his voice as the first flamenco cante they were exposed to. Even if one did not understand the words, he had a capacity to transmit the deepest sentiments flamenco can produce.
One can only lament then, that this artist, at the age of 40, today February 13 succumbed to an illness that began exactly a year ago when his singing career was cut short and he was hospitalised with a brain tumor. He had a brief period of recovery, performing in September of 2009 in the flamenco peña that bears his name, as well as a performance in said peña in November that I was very fortunate to have attended. That night, not expecting to, I was once again with the hairs on the back of my neck on end, captivated by his performance. That night, with the humility of a man who had stared death in the face he thanked profoundly the crowd who had come to see him and who cheered him at every opportunity. Little did I know that his situation would slowly deteriorate afterwards, leading to the cancellation of his planned performance in the upcoming Jerez Flamenco Festival only a week ago. Tomorrow, February 14, at the Parroquía La Asunción in Jerez, his funeral will be held at 16:30. Fernando Terremoto- a life cut too short….a flamenco artist from Jerez without peer.
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