Belén Maya experiments with flamenco
in the new show ‘Souvenir’

The bailaora uses contemporary dance, dramatic art and electronic music

Flamenco-world.com, April 2007

Belén Maya. 2007 Tour

Belén Maya experiments. With the pretext of using flamenco’s memory, she takes another step forward in her career as an artist. The bailaora premieres ‘Souvenir’, a show in which she combines “three elements that distort the overall vision we have of flamenco: the actor, touches of contemporary dance and electronic music”. The show, co-directed with dancer Juan Carlos Lérida and actor David Montero, is performed for the first time on stage on April 12th, 2007 at Seville’s Sala Joaquín Turina, within the 2006/2007 Flamenco Thursdays Series.

Belén Maya (Photo Belén Maya Company)

“There’s a big mixture of strange elements for a flamenco show”. That’s how Belén Maya sums up the experimentation offered in ‘Souvenir’. And to make it materialize, she has surrounded herself with a multidisciplinary team including as co-directors the dancer and choreographer Juan Carlos Lérida, in charge of “the touches of contemporary dance”; and actor David Montero, whose “whose main job is to set up pictures, like sorts of flamenco postcards”. In an interview by Javier Rojas released by the company, he adds that “everything leads to something else, it gets stranger and stranger, it sticks in more extraordinary elements, but in the end there’s a good common thread, since the actor serves as a guide throughout the show”.

In Montero’s words, ‘Souvenir’ is “a show about time and death, about memory; about masks and the faces which are hidden behind them, about the life throbbing in every picture. A passionate, ironic look at flamenco’s dead and their shadow which stretches out and resides in the present”. And to reach that concept, it puts itself in the shoes of the listener: “There’s another flamenco which doesn’t happen on stages. It happens in the rooms of houses where anonymous enthusiasts listen to recordings from the past in solitude and with nearly religious veneration. In them, it’s not unusual for the enthusiast to greet a certain section with an olé or to do compás (not always correctly, but always passionately) like any other clapper”.

	Belén Maya (Photo Daniel Muñoz)

The show, co-produced by Barcelona’s Teatre Mercat de les Flors, is structured in two parts: the first, an hour in length, includes several pieces of more traditional flamenco; and the second sticks in electronic sounds for thirty minutes. In total, there are twelve pieces worked out with flamenco styles and ‘tales’ by Montero in between, with such suggestive titles as ‘Un réquiem fragmentario y doliente’ por fandangos, ‘Fotografías a letra’ for the zambra; ‘Tangos de Granada, Granada, Granada’; and ‘La voz de su amo’ for the final number with music by David J. Fonseca.

The live flamenco music is taken care of by guitarist José Luis Rodríguez, cantaores Rosario la Tremendita and Jesús Corbacho, plus Vanessa Coloma and Ana Calí on compás and baile. The team is completed by stage designer Santiago Barber, Olga García on lighting, Rafael Sánchez on sound and Carmen Sánchez on wardrobe design.

Following the premiere of ‘Souvenir’ at Seville’s Sala Joaquín Turina on April 12th, Belén Maya continues on tour with the new show, her previous production ‘Dibujos’ and ‘Flamenco de cámara’, a show she shares with cantaora Mayte Martín. Besides several Spanish cities, she is scheduled to visit France, Bulgaria and Sweden.

More information: Special feature. Belén Maya, 'Souvenir'. Premiere. Jueves Flamencos 2007 de Sevilla Interview with Belén Maya, bailaora and choreographer (February 2005) 2003 Festival de Jerez. Belén Maya and Mayte Martín, ‘Flamenco de cámara’