Generaciones Gira Japón

13 July 1984 is a turning point in Spanish dance. That day the Ballet Nacional de España presented at the Zarzuela a programme that thirty years later still remains in the memory of those who watched it. One of the numbers was Ritmos, a piece Alberto Lorca dedicated to one of the icons of Spanish dance, Encarnación López “La Argentinita”. With this choreography Lorca did the same that George Balanchine had done regarding classical dance, with a piece like Theme and Variations. José Nieto’s music –a score both “heterodox” and fascinating– provides the backdrop for classical-pure Spanish dance movements, a range of steps in a work ruled by abstraction and full of magnetic dynamism. 

Ritmos performance (Teatro de la Zarzuela, 2009)

This piece has its origins in the time Rubén Olmo asked me to create a new ad-hoc choreography with the First Dancer of the Ballet Nacional de España, Inmaculada Salomón. We had struck up a mutual understanding while putting together Electra (2017), a complicity that allowed us to go deeper into the creative process this time round, with an intimacy that is inherent in solo performance, but with a subtlety and nuance that only a performer of her sensitivity, maturity and experience can aspire to. As a result of my interest in Spain’s musical heritage, I discovered the Sevillian composer, Manuel Blasco De Nebra (1750-1784), and his original repertoire of Sonatas and Pastorelas for harpsichord and pianoforte. It was playing around with his music that inspired this creation. Its choreographic
language navigates, without prejudice, the bolero school and stylised contemporary dance, placing Goyaesque cadences and deconstructions alongside elements from the dance of today. With pristine
lighting and old-time wardrobe design, Pastorela is a poetic dialogue between music and movement, between the ephemeral and the eternal. A miniature of that which is past, a relic of that which is to come.
Antonio Ruz

"In our collective imaginery, jacaranda is the tree that grows in many cities in Latin America. It is synonymous with the arrival of spring and its blossoms. It is an ornamental tree with tubular, blue-purple flowers, but also a symbol of femininity, beauty, essence, fragrance. Jacaranda is a sunset stroll, the dance of a woman. It is a symbiosis between the essences of nature and womanhood."
Rubén Olmo

Antonio Ruiz Soler’s interpretation of Pablo Sarasate’s score boosted his profile as a dancer and choreographer, and it became one of the mainstays of his repertoire from its debut in 1946 at the Teatro Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires. The influence of claque on the technique of this particular zapateado makes it a perfect example of virtuosic, stylised flamenco. In 1959, Antonio performed a version of this solo as he walked down a country road in the film Honeymoon, an Anglo-Spanish co-production directed by Michael Powell, visually reminiscent of Gene Kelly in An American in Paris. Over the years, it has been performed by countless leading dancers of various companies, each one trying to follow Antonio’s maxim: “Dancing it means caressing the floor; you have to speak with the floor, not kick it”.

Teaser

The shapes, movements and lines of this choreography caress the notes once composed by Ravel, blending the purest classical Spanish style with the essence of flamenco dance. The Art Nouveau-inspired set, featuring mirrors that reflect the beautiful silhouettes draped in silk of vibrant hues, contrasts with the austerity of the leather in the men’s costume.

Bolero (Teatro de la Zarzuela, Madrid, 1988)

Antonio Canales created this choreography for the Ballet Nacional de España. The ballet goes briefly through different types of flamenco: Seguiriyas, Soleás, Alegrías, Tientos and Tangos.

Teaser 1

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