2005 JEREZ FESTIVAL. EVA YERBABUENA: A CUATRO VOCES

Artistic intelligence

Silvia Calado. Jerez, March 4th, 2005

‘A cuatro voces’. Eva Yerbabuena Ballet Flamenco. Baile: Eva Yerbabuena, Mercedes de Córdoba, María Moreno, Sonia Poveda, Asunción Pérez Choni, Luis Miguel González, Juan Manuel Zurano, Eduardo Guerrero, Amador Rojas, Alejandro Rodríguez. Cante: Enrique Soto, Rafael de Utrera, Pepe de Pura, Jeromo Segura. Guitar: Paco Jarana, Manuel de la Luz. Saxophone, flute: Ignacio Vidachea. Percussion: Antonio Coronel. Choreography: Eva Yerbabuena. Music: Paco Jarana. Lyrics: Horatius García. Stage director: Eva Yerbabuena. Villamarta Theater. Jerez (Cádiz, Spain), March 4th, 2005. 9 p.m.

Eva Yerbabuena (Photo: Daniel Muñoz)

Eva Yerbabuena brings the show ‘A cuatro voces’, now more mature since its premiere in Seville's latest Bienal, to the Jerez Festival. The show has gained coherence with the change in the ending (the soleá for the alegría) and has lightened the density of the premiere version. And it's now more dynamic, more fluent, more essential. The emotionality hardly comes across any hindrances in being received. And it's brought about both by Eva Yerbabuena's out-of-this-world interpretative idiosyncrasy and the concepts approached by this work, inspired by the poetry of Miguel Hernández, Vicente Aleixandre, Federico García Lorca and Blas de Otero. Four voices and as many perceptions of existence. And the thing is that, as the poet says, “this show is life the way I would make it”.

The first voice is that of Miguel Hernández. Eva Yerbabuena performs the choreography ‘Hembra’, with piano by Debussy... and silence. The spirit of movement, scarce. The serrana and the seguiriya give cause for the first choreographies of the group... in mourning. Percussion. Bits and pieces. And to the side, dressed in white, Pepe de Pura on cante. Esthetic, tense, intense scenes. Absolute dramatic art when bailaora and cantaor fall to their knees. Pathos. Artistic intelligence.

Taking over from the trance is the second voice, that of Vicente Aleixandre. ‘Velintonia, 3’. A round of fandangos. Four-man baile. Eva Yerbabuena joins in, dressed in crimson. Soleá through bulerías. Autumn leaves tumble. Federico comes. The girl plays on the bed of flowers. The poet is still. Eva Yerbabuena is still. Paco Jarana performs the music from the poem ‘Asesinato’ composed by Juan Carlos Romero. Rafael de Utrera sings it the way Enrique Morente would. The street sweepers pile up the leaves at the feet of the verse. Black. White. A game of chess. Tientos tangos. Paco Jarana's guitar is, at the least, very beautiful. Vibrant rhythm for slow-motion baile. Affliction. Baile and ‘non-baile’. And she remains alone, through bulerías. There are no adjectives left to describe the baile of this woman who seeks to cause agony. Crucifixion. Death. And back to life: lullaby. A cante forward, the first ending. A baile forward, the end. Eva Yerbabuena sums it up through soleá, between four cante flanks. Great soleá. Great her. Depth. Abyss. And ascent at the same time. “This is my place, my land. And I wouldn't change it for anything”. So be it.

And Rafael el Negro

	José Luis Ortiz Nuevo, Manolete, Matilde Coral, Rafael el Negro and Chano Lobato (Photo: Daniel Muñoz)

Bodega de los Apóstoles had a surprise up its sleeve after midnight, of the kind that go down in history. Rafael el Negro got up on stage to dance through bulerías in the grand finale of the show ‘Historias de arte’ by his wife Matilde Coral and cantaor Chano Lobato. It hadn't happened for many years, it had been many years since the bailaor had given away a bit of his distinction, of his essential baile. That timeless picture was impressive which finished off the show of danced, sung and spoken art which has been performed on stages over the past couple of seasons by these two flamenco maestros. They tell their jokes, talk about hard times in the past, about flamenco life before which, as Matilde Coral put it quite well, differs from the one now in the hunger. And in between chats, Chano Lobato sings alegrías, tanguillos, bulerías... which, if they catch her in the mood, are danced to by the Sevillian maestra. Last night she had her moment, short but sweet, through alegrías, with a coral-color manila shawl flying about her eternal chignon. What a pleasurable way to put the finishing touch on a day when the cold was fought off by tides of feeling.

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