Oberon's Glade

Tag: Fanny Ara

  • Flamenco Vivo Carlota Santana @ The Joyce ~ 2024

    Screenshot 2024-06-22 at 22-26-30 FANNY ARA (@fannyara) • Instagram photos and videos

    Above: dancer Fanny Ara

    ~ Author: Oberon

    Sunday June 23rd, 2024 – Flamenco Vivo Carlota Santana presenting the US premiere performances of  EQUILIBRIO (Clásica/Tradición) by Emilio Ochando. Featuring nine dancers and musicians, the work embraces flamenco tradition while creating a unique staging of dances set to an original score by guitarist Daniel Jurado and featuring multi-instrumentalist Gonzalo Grau.

    On the hottest day of the Summer (so far…and we are only on day 3) – with a high of 95 degrees – it was unfortunate that The Joyce’s air conditioning was malfunctioning. This made for a sweaty audience experience, and I can only imagine the effect on the dancers. But they persevered, looking as proud, noble, and sexy as ever; that’s an odd trio of adjectives, no?  But that describes them perfectly.

    Today’s program was rather different from last season’s Flamenco Vivo production; today was more of an ensemble affair. There were some impressive solos but none of the free-standing flamenco showpieces that feel like great operatic arias; instead, Mr. Ochando’s EQUILIBRIO had a more organic quality. Three fantastic musicians guaranteed an afternoon of fabulous music: Mr. Jurado is a guitarist de luxe, and Mr. Grau is extraordinary in his range, playing keyboard, drums, and cello in turn. (I bet if someone handed him a bassoon or trumpet, he could manage that as well). Vocalist Loreto De Diego displayed a multi-hued sound that ranged from slightly raspy parlando to clear, sensuous soft tones to full-fledged Broadway-style belting. Her singing was emotion-drenched and heartily applauded.

    Lighting designer Daisy Long kept things simple and effective. Large moveable rectangles of tube lighting changed hues to fit the mood of the music, and were easily shifted about the stage by the dancers, giving each of the scores thirteen movements a distinctive character. Carmelita Vestuario’s costuming had the women in red gowns with black underskirts and the men in fitted black trousers and red shirts (later, they donned black skirts for a while). Castanets, the iconic sound of flamenco, were often in use, delightfully played by the six dancers.

    Flamenco vivo 2024

    Above: the Company

    The afternoon opened with a keyboard solo from Mr. Grau. All six dancers appear with their castanets for a gorgeous opening, red skirts swirling. Mr. Jurado’s guitar comes in for the second movement, and Ms. De Diego’s voice begins to entrance us.

    Mr. Grau takes up the cello for a riveting fandango in which dancer Emilio Ochando, lying on his back, gives a virtuoso performance with the castanets. The clarity of his playing was amazing, especially when he honed the volume down to a mere whisper. Mr. Ochando then dons a vest embellished with silver bells for El Vito, with Ms. de Diego showing her vocal range whilst the three female dancers – Fanny Ara, Lorena Franco, and Laura Peralta – clap in varying rhythms.

    A somewhat competitive duet ensues, with Fernando Jimenez and Yoel Vargas doing some dynamic foot stamping; castanets continue to entice, and the four women observe the men’s ‘duel’, calling out to them, egging them on.

    The musicians take over for Zambra, a slow lament for cello, guitar, and voice. Then the music speeds up, and all six dancers take up spoons for a rhythmic ensemble piece…big, lush dancing here: the audience loved it.

    A classic Spanish fringed shawl is passed from dancer to dancer in Alegrias; Fanny Ara was especially captivating here, manipulating the shawl with flair. The six dancers, seated in a row of chairs, have a marvelous piece full of synchronized hand gestures and animated clapping. Again, the audience seemed to take special pleasure in this segment.

    I now realized that my note-taking was all jumbled and over-written; this usually happens at The Joyce where the house is in deep darkness during most performances. Further notes became impossible, but I must mention a passionate ‘aria’ sung by Ms. de Diego before the afternoon’s finale was reached.

    A large crowd gathered in the lower lobby after the performance where there was an impromptu Q and A, and where I got to greet the beautiful Ms. Ara: the dancer who first turned me on to flamenco. Bravissima Fanny!

    ~ Oberon

  • Pivotal Works at Joyce SoHo

    Fanny ara

    Above: Fanny Ara

    Friday November 16, 2012 – The Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise this year honors foreign-born dance professionals working in the USA. The current winner is Michel Kouakou from the Ivory Coast; he will have his own evening at Joyce SoHo on November 17th, which unfortunately I cannot attend. Tonight the four “runners-up” presented their work at the Mercer Street venue.

    Any day that we fall in love is a good day; it doesn’t matter whether the object of our adoration is a boy from far away whose face we saw on a website or a dancer or singer who moves and touches us with their beauty and talent. My newest love is Fanny Ara, a gorgeous Flamenco artist who opened the evening with a pair of resplendant solos that literally made my heart race. Her first solo Romance was a slow and very personal contemporary ‘echo’ of the Flamenco style: I immediately fell under her spell – so alluring, so poised and self-confident, even in the dance’s most reflective nuances. Then a vivid pure Flamenco solo, Soler, in which the captivating expressive qualities of Fanny’s upper body, arms and hands – even her neck – mesmerized us while her footwork dazzled both the eye and the ear. Guitarist Jason MacGuire provided fabulously colorful playing in both works, joined in Soler by the vocalist Jose Cortes, whose slightly raspy quality had its own sexual edge. In the course of her 15-minute performance, Fanny Ara soared into the upper-most echelon of dance artists I have witnessed over the years.

    My friend Tom and I enthused over Fanny’s dancing while the stagehands took up the special flooring. Tom was just as thrilled by what we’d seen as I was.

    Two works by the Vietnamese-born choreographer Thang Dao followed: a large ensemble piece called S.O.S. is danced to a dynamic pop/rock song (Life Is A Pigsty by Morrissey) and a more refined, narrative work LENORE inspired by Edgar Allen Poe. In both pieces, Thang Dao showed fine craftsmanship and musicality. In S.O.S. there was a restless energy and much fast-paced partnering, with solo passages woven in. The dancers – and I am always happy to find dancers I know on any stage (Chris Bloom, Aaron Atkins and Virgina Horne were among Thang Dao’s ensemble) – kept the eye darting about the space, trying to take it all in. In the more aptly poetic LENORE, a mirage-like tracery of Bartok underpinned Basil Rathbone’s reading of The Raven, the poet in his white nightshirt is haunted by a trio of ravens and the endless intoning of ‘the word that was spoken’: Nevermore.

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    From Scandanavia, the cool beauty of Pontus Lidberg (above, Nir Arieli photo) seemed the external masque of a man with a secret passion. From his WITHIN (Laybrinth Within) Pontus danced the opening solo which we’d just seen a few days ago when MORPHOSES premiered the dance/film masterpiece at the bigger Joyce. This visual poem evolves into a filmed passage of Pontus in a forest or standing on a lonely beach. The solo works well as a free-standing evocation of the longer work. And it’s a tremendous pleasure to watch Pontus Lidberg dance.

    Of the evening’s final work, a deadly dull and painfully protracted food fight, I’m not naming names. It simply reminded me of a conversation that Woody Allen has with his wife in the film CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS. Urged to abandon his pathetic aspirations as a documentary film-maker, Woody reminds his wife: “Hey, I won Honorable Mention at that film competition last year!” to which she coolly replies: “Everyone who entered won Honorable Mention!”