Marina Heredia at Lisner Auditorium. February 21, 2010
Congrats to Lisner Auditorium on its tenth year of hosting the Flamenco Festival! February 21, 2010
It's probably Sunday February 28th when you're reading this, but I actually wrote this blog entry a few days earlier and used a feature in Movable Type to automatically publish the entry a few days later. Pretty cool in a geeky way, no? :-)
Anywayz, Lisner Auditorium's 10th annual Flamenco Festival has come and gone. I realize ten is just an arbitrary number to celebrate, but I still think it's something worthy of praise. It's not easy to fill-up a 1500 seat auditorium for all the festival concerts year after year. Kudos to the director and staff of Lisner Auditorium!
But while the festival presenters do have to strive to at least break even, it's not unusual to take a risk with performances to broaden the DC audience's exposure to flamenco. Dance concerts almost always sell well, but cante concerts are another story.
I can remember in February 2004 when singer José Merce came to DC and performed a cante concert with guitarist Moraíto and only half the seats were filled. Still a very good concert, but a little disheartening to see so many empty seats for such a well-known and respected flamenco singer. Same turnout with singer Rafael de Utrera in October 2004. The point is that as inspiring and important as cante is in flamenco, it usually doesn't sell very well with the DC general public—I can't speak for other cities around the USA, but I'm sure it's probably the same elsewhere, or not. (Flamenco aficionados from other locales, please feel free to contradict me and leave a comment below!)
Singer Marina Heredia with Mateo Romero, Hector Márquez and Miguelito. February 21, 2010
I had heard of Marina Heredia before. My friend Juan Martín (not the famous flamenco guitarist from Málaga) gave me her debut CD Me duele, me duele way back in 2001. Was one of my favorite CD's for a while and 9 years later, I never thought I'd have the pleasure of hearing her sing in DC. But thanks to Lisner, I did!
It was 90-minute performance with no intermission. She was accompanied by guitarists José Quevedo "El Bolita" and Luís Mariano with chorus and palmas by Ana Rivera and Reyes Martín as well as Marina's sister Jara Heredia who danced a few numbers.
My guitarist friend Behzad Habibzai kept track of and wrote down each and every flamenco palo featured in the concert which alternated between flamenco and Arab-Andalusian and a mixture of the two. Sometimes all the musicians played together. Other times the flamenco guitarists rested their hands while the Chekara Arab-Andalusian Orchestra of Tetouan played. The "orchestra" consisted of violinist/vocalist Jallal Chekara, Abdelaziz Sansaoui on the qanun, oud player/vocalist Youssef el Joussaieni, Mouhssine Koraichi on the darbouka. (Note: I'm just copying the names from the concert program...so it won't reflect any last-minute changes in artists.)
Guitarist José Quevedo "El Bolita" with Mateo. February 21, 2010
I didn't find any reviews in any Washington DC-based news sources. But here's a review of Marina Heredia's New York performance.
So after the concert, I did what I always do: go backstage to meet the artists. Not that I'm a groupie or anything—OK maybe a little. :-) Actually I'm just doing my job as self-appointed historian of the DC flamenco scene: meet and greet with the performers and take a few pics. Somebody's gotta do it, so it might as well be me.
I do this backstage visit so often that the flamenco festival tour manager already recognizes even though she only sees me once a year at Lisner. After making it past security, I usually go into the green room and approach whoever happens to be there. Usually the star of the show hangs out in his/her dressing room and is inaccessible. But this time around, the tour manager, Lola, actually invited me to meet Marina!
This caught me off guard...I wasn't prepared for this. Sure enough, 30 seconds later Lola gestured me to follow her down the hallway and knocked on Marina's dressing room door and there she was! And I froze for a moment to think of something to say beyond the customary "Felicitaciones!"
In my limited Spanish, I expressed on behalf of the DC flamenco community our appreciation for her coming to DC and performing. But what was cool was how down-to-earth she was and that she was willing to meet me and my two friends who came along, Hector Márquez and Mateo Romero, who I think were just as speechless as I was in meeting Marina.
Violinist Jallal Chekara and oud player Youssef el Houssaieni of Chekara Arab-Andalusian Orchestra of Tetouan with Miguelito, Hector and Mateo. February 21, 2010
I know what you're thinking now: "So Miguelito...did you ask Marina and the musicians to hang out afterwards?" The answer is "No." Usually I leave that up to them to ask me. And it has happened a few times over the years. Back in 2000, I ended up hanging out with Farruquito and his guitarist El Perla and a couple of hotties...but that's a story for another time. :-)
Between Snowmageddon (or "Snomenco" as Lisner marketing director Carl Graci describes it) and having to work on nights that coincided with concert dates, I was only able to go to one of the five concerts* in the flamenco festival series this year. Oh well...usually I don't mind the tradeoff and while I have a blast performing flamenco several nights a week, I have to admit that being busy working at night does have its disadvantages. Hmmm...so for the 2011 flamenco festival, I'll ask the Lisner staff to schedule the concert dates around my gig schedule. Yeah right. :-)
* Just an added note for those of you not from the DC area. Lisner Auditorium's 10th Annual Flamenco Festival included the following:
- Gala Flamenca featuring Pastora Galván, Manuel Liñán, Belén López and Rocío Molina
- Compañía María Pagés
- Compañía Rocío Molina
- Marina Heredia & the Chekara Arab-Andalusian Orchestra of Tetouan
- Compañía Israel Galván
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