2006 JEREZ FLAMENCO FESTIVAL. BLANCA DEL REY/ FOSFORITO

Master's

Silvia Calado. Jerez, March 11th, 2006
Photos: Daniel Muñoz

Closing gala. Blanca del Rey: baile. Pedro Montoya, Pedro Sanz: cante. Curro de Jerez, Felipe Maya: guitar/ Fosforito: cante. Manuel Silveria: guitar. 10th Jerez Festival 2006. Teatro Villamarta. Jerez (Cádiz, Spain), March 11th, 2006. 9 p.m.

Blanca del Rey (Photo: Daniel Muñoz)

One decade. Festival de Jerez has celebrated its tenth anniversary. Sixteen intense days which for several hundred people have been a true master's course in flamenco dancing, both through the shows offered at the different stages and the training courses with the genre's top maestros, as well as through the encounters and experience only a festival this embraceable can guarantee. Still awaiting the official attendance figures, it is already clear that this year the festival, if possible, has become somewhat greater... in quantity, quality and variety. And the closing day, when many course students had already begun their return trip home - as could be seen by some empty seats in the crowd -, if not a treat, was a tribute to the maestros who are pillars of this artform. Guitar: Rafael Riqueni offered a memorable concert at Sala La Compañía. Baile: Blanca del Rey was touching with her shawl soleá and her huge feeling. Cante: Fosforito made an effort to pull out of himself what has made him deserving of the fifth Llave de Oro Award in flamenco history.

Blanca del Rey (Foto: Daniel Muñoz)

Blanca del Rey under the spotlight. Just arms. Just hands. Just palms up in the air. A few touches of light heel tapping. Everything in silence. When cante speaks, the castanets answer. Seguiriya in a bata de cola. Positioning and moderation. Her stylized arms lift up to the heavens. Her body withdraws. The bailaora creates mutant climates. Exquisite delicacy when moving around. The piece achieves a halo of confession. The soleá with a shawl will be the catharsis. Blanca del Rey has just lost her husband, Manuel del Rey, manager of the oldest tablao in Spain, El Corral de la Morería, just when the outstanding venue is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary. And that feeling showed through in her spectacular baile. A body-to-body duel between the woman and that volatile element which is the Manila shawl. A job of taming, a challenge to control the uncontrollable. Something lyrical. An esthetic whole. The shawl is Blanca. Blanca is the shawl. Watching them is hypnotic. There's hardly any earth. Everything's air. Fringes which sketch the music, elaborating on the lyrics, the finishes, the quejíos. When woman and shawl finally stop, you can hear their weeping.

	Fosforito (Photo: Daniel Muñoz)

Fosforito is a living monument to the last century of cante flamenco history. Just his presence is worthy of applause, as was demonstrated by the welcome he got from enthusiasts. Before receiving the always controversial Llave de Oro Award for cante, he'd been retired for years. It is therefore unnecessary to explain that for him, offering a performance today is a real effort and a struggle against the toll taken by the passing of time. The intelligence of the cantaor, who Jerez already awarded the National Cante Prize in 1968 established by the Cátedra de Flamencología (Institute of Flamencology), became palpable in the mere fact of choosing a top-notch guitarist to be at his side. Manuel Silveria has everything necessary in a guitarist of his time. And he received not just a few olés from the crowd. The elegant cantaor maestro struggled against the elements to put together a performance in which he revised soleá, alegrías, petenera, tientos, mineras, bulerías... An encyclopedic repertoire in which every set of lyrics was uttered like advice from a wise man. The gallant picture, the echo of what once was, the obvious wisdom... left the troubles in a remote middle distance. Thank you, maestro.

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