News (Noticias) Tagged ‘GALA Hispanic Theatre’

Heat up your holidays with FUEGO FLAMENCO, a sizzling festival exploring the diversity and depth of flamenco, the passionate and time-honored Spanish art form that has captivated audiences worldwide. During this three-week festival, GALA will showcase different forms of flamenco through the works of two artistic companies featuring outstanding international, national and local artists, as well as offer a program of lecture demonstrations. FUEGO FLAMENCO is part of GALA’s ArteAmericA Series presented in collaboration with the Washington Performing Arts Society. All performances and activities take place at GALA Hispanic Theatre, 3333 14th Street, NW 20010.

FUEGO FLAMENCO opens with Ida y vuelta presented by Fundación Conservatorio Flamenco Casa Patas of Madrid, Spain. Choreographed and performed by Guadalupe Torres with musical direction by Luis Miguel Manzano, Ida y vuelta will be performed on Thursday, Nov. 20, Friday, Nov. 21, and Saturday, Nov. 22 at 8 pm, and Sunday, Nov. 23 at 3 pm. The festival continues with Flamenco en Familia, a free day of interactive demonstrations in flamenco footwork, fans, castanets and guitar on Saturday, Nov. 29 from 11 am to 4 pm.

The festival ends with the world premiere of Dos Mundos choreographed by Edwin Aparicio and performed by Flamenco Aparicio Dance Company. featuring the renowned artist, prom Spain, La Tati. Performances of Dos Mundos are Saturday, Dec. 6 at 8 pm and Sunday, Dec. 7 at 3 pm.

Lynne and Joseph Horning are Honorary Producers of FUEGO FLAMENCO. The festival is made possible with the generous support of the National Endowment for the Arts, DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, Tivoli Partners Commercial, LLC, Fundación Conservatorio Flamenco Casa Patas, the Embassy of Spain in the United States, and Spain’s Ministry of Culture. Edwin Aparicio is the festival resident coordinator.

Ida y vuelta will feature flamenco dancers Guadalupe Torres and José Maldonado; singers Francisco Luis Trinidad Angel (El Trini de la Isla) and Jose Anillo; guitarist Luis Miguel Manzano; and saxophonist and flutist Diego Villegas. Casas Patas is a world-renowned Madrid tablao, hosting some of the best and most authentic flamenco in Spain. Famous groups and new talent sometimes share the same stage to create memorable productions. The Fundación Conservatorio Flamenco Casa Patas grew out of this club and today sponsors workshops, seminars, and exhibitions promoting the art of flamenco.

Guadalupe Torres obtained a degree in Spanish Dance from the Real Conservatorio Profesional de Danza de Madrid and has studied with Rafaela Carrasco, Eva la Yerbabuena, Rafael Amargo, Bélen Maya, Farruquito, La Farruca, and Aída Gómez, among others. She has appeared with Compañía de Nuria Pomares and Compañia Andaluza, with which she toured to New York, Boston, and Washington, DC. She has appeared in festivals throughout the world, and was awarded Second Prize for Choreography by Teatro Albéniz.

El Trini de la Isla was born in Cádiz, where he studied with master artist Manuel Soto El Sordera. He has worked at such renowned tablaos as El Cordobés in Barcelona and Los Gallos in Seville. He also has performed with flamenco artists such as Juan Ogalla, Rosario Toledo, Mercedes Ruíz, Andrés Peña, and La Chiqui de Jerez, among others.

Luis Miguel Manzano (Musical Director, Guitar) began studying guitar at the age of 16 with Aquilino Jiménez “El Entri” and made his professional debut at 19. A member of the Pelá family, his great grandfather was Tio Pelá, who played for Carmen Amaya; and his father was a flamenco guitarist and his mother the dancer Loli, La Pelá. He has performed with Merche Esmeralda, Domingo Ortega, María Pagés, Los Farruco and El Güito.

GALA’s free flamenco for all ages!
Flamenco en familia, will take place on Saturday, November 29 in two sessions:  11am to 12:30 pm, and 2 to 3:30 pm. Through interactive demonstrations, audiences will have the opportunity to learn about zapateo, popular classic Spanish dances, castanets, and guitar and to participate on stage with leading local artists and teachers. Directed by Edwin Aparicio, the program features bailaora Sara Jerez as the lead dancer/teacher, and acclaimed guitarist Michael Pérez, who will also provide guitar demonstrations. Although free and open to the general public, registration is required by calling 202-234-7174.

The third and final weekend of FUEGO FLAMENCO will feature Flamenco Aparicio Dance Company with the acclaimed artist “La Tati” from Spain. The company will present a new work, Dos mundos, on Saturday, December 6 at 8 pm and Sunday, December 7 at 3 pm. Aparicio and La Tati promise to raise the roof with their fiery foot stomping and dazzling musicality.

Edwin Aparicio is an internationally acclaimed dancer and choreographer who has shared the stage with such renowned artists as Carmela Greco, Chuscales, and Silverio Heredia, among others. He studied flamenco in Spain with “La Tati” and Tomá de Madrid, and in 2001 made his flamenco debut at Casa Patas in Madrid. In Washington, DC, he studied with Ana Martínez and performed with the Washington Opera at the Kennedy Center in El Gato Montes (1997) and Don Giovanni (2003). Mr. Aparicio toured the United States with Reynaldo Rincón’s Romeria Flamenca, was the featured artist in 2002 and 2005 at the Chicago Flamenco Festival, and appeared at the 2004 and 2005 Flamenco in the Sun Annual Festival in Miami with Belén Maya, Pastora Galvan, Pedro Cortes and José Luis Rodríguez. In 2005, he also performed with Jóvenes Flamenco as a soloist and a company member at the Centro Cultural de San Bals in Madrid, Spain. Aparicio was the choreographer for GALA’s premiere production in its new theater in 2005 of Yerma by Federico García Lorca. For the past four years, Aparicio has been the coordinator and a featured performer for FUEGO FLAMENCO.

La Tati, known by many as “Madrid’s flamenco dancer”, began performing professionally at the age of 12 at the famous Tablao Zambra in Madrid, where she was introduced to artists of the purest flamenco traditions. At age 15, she toured Europe with Festival Flamenco Gitano and has toured to Africa, Asia, Australia, and the United States since. In the late 1980s, La Tati founded her own company and her productions have been praised for their wealth of ideas and innovation and the beauty of her interpretation.

TICKETS: Single tickets are $30 and Student Tickets are $20. A Discount Festival Ticket is $50. The Noche de GALA for FUEGO FLAMENCO is Friday, November 21. Noche de GALA tickets are $40 per person and $75 for couples and include the performance and post-performance reception.

FOR TICKETS CALL (202) 234-7174 or 800- 494-8497

or visit www.galatheatre.org

CONTACT:
Lina Morales lina@galatheatre.org 202 234 7174″

IF YOU DON’T SPEAK SPANISH, you might need to see the Gala Hispanic Theatre’s production of Federico Garcia Lorca’s “Blood Wedding” a few times to take it all in. While the theater does provide surtitles, reading them means missing much of the action below.

Hugo Medrano’s direction of the classic 1932 romantic tragedy excels in sheer beauty and with emotional pull. Giorgio Tsappas’ sparse, arid set design and Martha Mountain and Klyph Stanford’s stage lighting transport the audience to Andalusia, the setting for a doomed wedding between a woman still grappling with her affections for a former paramour, and a virile young lad who, despite his mother’s reticence about the bride, is madly in love.”*

*From: http://www.readexpress.com
Traducido: usando Google o Altavista/Babel Fish

A podcast interview with Abel Lopez, associate producing director of GALA (Grupo Artistas Latinoamericanos) Hispanic Theatre and playwright Gustavo Ott is available in the Podcast Section of Hispanic Marketing & Public Relations, HispanicMPR.com. During the podcast, they discuss issues affecting Latinos in contemporary society and “Your Molotov Kisses,” Gustavo’s play, with Elena del Valle, host of the HispanicMPR.com podcast.”*

*From: http://www.hispanicmpr.com
Traducido: usando Google o Altavista/Babel Fish

A contented upscale couple in an unnamed Latin American city are ready to make a baby. What can this possibly have to do with Islamic terrorism?

“Latin American theater is more open than American theater in its style,” says Venezuelan playwright Gustavo Ott, who forges the unlikely link in “Tu Ternura Molotov” (”Your Molotov Kisses”) at GALA Hispanic Theatre. “In our theater, it’s easy for us to do almost anything on the stage.”"*

*From: http://www.washingtonpost.com
Traducido: usando Google o Altavista/Babel Fish

“The line “Dont try this at home” does not appear in “Latido Negro: Perus African Beat,” an informative but awkwardly written primer on Afro-Peruvian music and dance. But you could almost see GALA Hispanic Theatre asking scriptwriter Fernando Barreto to add the warning. After all, among the choreographic traditions covered in this production is a too-hot-to-handle form called the alcatraz.

In the alcatraz, dancers sporting tissues affixed to their lower backs vie against partners who try to ignite the material with candles. As the cast makes clear, its a highly erotic dance, playful as a game of tag but characterized by sinuous, hip-swinging movements that are suggestive enough to merit an R rating. The flames add a tantalizing hint of danger.”

“Hugo Medrano, artistic director of GALA Hispanic Theatre, will take to the stage twice next season, which will mark the companys 32nd year. The mainstage shows are presented in Spanish with English surtitles and performed in GALAs venue at the Tivoli, 14th Street and Park Road NW.”

“Attention all claustrophobes: Steer clear of Argentine playwright Griselda Gambaros “Las Paredes” “The Walls”, the current offering from GALA Hispanic Theatre. This grim political parable, which serves up a standard-issue, quasi-absurdist vision of totalitarianism, pivots on an image sure to give you the heebie-jeebies: a bedroom — or is it a prison cell? — with walls that gradually contract, crushing the terrified occupant.”

“GALA Hispanic Theatre is pleased to announce the U.S. Spanish language premiere of Las Paredes The Walls. This sharp and deeply ironic play by the controversial Argentine Griselda Gambaro, one of Latin Americas foremost contemporary playwrights, is the second production of our 2006-2007 season, Her Work, His Staging, an ongoing celebration of Hispanic female playwrights. Directed by Gabriel Garcia, the play runs February 1 to 25 2007 at GALA Theatre-Tivoli, at 3333 14th Street NW.”

“The guitar might be the instrument most associated with flamenco, but the piano took center stage Friday and Saturday at the start of GALA Hispanic Theatre’s second annual flamenco festival with Pablo Rubén Maldonado’s “Almanjáyar.”

The Granada-born classical pianist’s fusion of Spanish Gypsy tradition and jazz is hardly new, but Maldonado’s contemporary compositions take it to a new level. The engaging performer played superbly, as did percussionist Moisés Natenzon and bassist Jorge Luis Cerrato Méndez, although the flamenco root was at times elusive.”

“THE SPANISH LEGEND of Don Juan, a womanizer of epic proportions, has inspired artists as diverse as Mozart, the poet Byron and playwright George Bernard Shaw. Now, the infamous seducer, as created by handsome gay Spanish actor Mel Rocher, has arrived in D.C. in Gala Hispanic Theatre’s “Valor, agravio y mujer ”¦ Stripping Don Juan,” which is currently open and running through Oct. 22.”

“It wasn’t exactly a teenybopper crowd that went wild at GALA Hispanic Theatre on Saturday night for the rapso group 3canal, the indisputable stars of the music and poetry show “Caribeana Imperia.” Diplomats waved their arms in the air and women almost old enough to be the performers’ mothers danced with abandon and cooed about what one dubbed the three “delicious” young men from Trinidad and Tobago and their fiery, danceable music.

Clearly some of the audience at the “Caribeana” opening was already hip to 3canal and its calypso-driven rap. The rest found out fast, or as fast as this peculiar hybrid show allows. The largely English-language “Caribeana” is half staged poetry, half concert — and to paraphrase Woody Allen, here’s hoping you get the half that sings.”

“On Thursday April 6th, 2006 HYP Network’s Vega Directorio en Español, launched the 21st edition for Northern Virginia at GALA Hispanic Theatre-Tivoli in Washington D.C. The directory’s cover features a reproduction of the winning entry of the second “Arte de America Hispana Contest” which ran from September 15th, 2005 through January 31st, 2006.This art competition promotes and celebrates the rich and diverse Hispanic Heritage throughout the Greater Washington D.C. Metropolitan Area. Local artists and art students 18 years and older, compete for a $3,000 grand prize by submitting original work that is the artist’s interpretation of Hispanic Heritage in our city.

A blue ribbon panel of judges consisting of 8 area dignitaries, local art galleries directors, directory’s clients and TV delegates selected the winning poster. Brenton Mulliner, HYP Network Regional Sales Director and General Sales Manager of VEGA Directorio en Español, Mario Sol, Evening News Anchor - Univision and Dayan Aldana, Morning Show Host - Mega Clasica presented the $3,000 award and commemorative plaque to Angela Lubinecky the local artist and winner of the competition. “

“Body language dominates GALA Hispanic Theatre’s hardworking production of “El Rufian Castrucho” (”Castrucho the Hustler”), a Spanish comedy about soldiers running amok in a foreign land. The actors speak and listen with such exaggerated intensity that they spend much of their time leaning or recoiling at 45-degree angles.

There is also much mincing and scampering, plus interludes of swordplay replete with cries of “Ha-HA!” followed by a certain amount of running away.”