Flamenco bailaora Manuela Carrasco
wins the 2007 National Dance Prize
Flamenco-world.com, November 2007
Manuela
Carrasco’s timeless art wins the top award in
Spanish dance. The Sevillian bailaora has been awarded
the 2007 National Dance Prize in the category of performance,
which is given every year by Spain’s Ministry of
Culture. The jury awarded her the prize “for her
essential contribution to flamenco dancing and for having
forged a meeting point with other cultures from the depths
of this artform”. Israel Galván, Eva Yerbabuena,
María Pagés and Sara Baras are some of the
flamenco bailaores who have won this award over the last
few years.
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Manuela Carrasco
(Photo Daniel Muñoz) |
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Manuela Carrasco was born in 1954 in
the neighborhood of Triana in Seville in a family of artists.
Her father is bailaor José Carrasco ‘El Sordo’
and her mother is related to Los Camborios. She didn’t
have any dance instructors; she was self-taught. Despite
the early opposition of her parents, she débuts
at the age of eleven at Seville’s Tablao La Cochera,
which no longer exists. At thirteen, she goes on a two-year
tour of Europe with Curro Vélez’s group.
Back in Seville, she performs at Tablao Los Gallos for
a year. Then she leaves for Madrid, where she begins to
dance as a soloist at Los Canasteros. She caused a sensation
due to her strength and her great temperament, besides
having ways reminiscent of the old-time bailaoras.
After triumphing at festivals such as
that of La Puebla de Cazalla (Seville), she wins the ‘Pastora
Imperio’ National Dance Prize at Córdoba’s
National Flamenco Art Contest in 1974. She also wins the
International Dance Prize in San Remo (Italy) in 1976,
the year after Paco de Lucía won the guitar award.
She takes part in shows such as ‘Gitano’ together
with Camarón, Pansequito and Lebrijano; ‘Ayer,
hoy y mañana del flamenco’; and in North
America in 1985, ‘Flamenco puro’ with Fernanda
de Utrera, Farruco and Chocolate, among others. At Seville’s
Bienal de Flamenco in 1992, she stars in the show ‘…Y
Sevilla’, directed by José Luis Ortiz Nuevo,
presented at La Maestranza Bullring.
In 1995 her historic soleá is
recorded by Carlos Saura in the film ‘Flamenco’,
a scene in which she is accompanied by the voice of José
Mercé. Heading up her own company, she tours with
shows such as ‘La Diosa’, ‘Así
baila Sevilla’ and ‘Jondo Adonai’. At
Seville’s 2002 Bienal, she presents ‘Esencias’
with the collaboration of artists like Chocolate and La
Negra. In the following edition of the Sevillian festival,
she premieres ‘Tronío’. With ‘Un
sorbito de lo sublime’, she has appeared in festivals
such as Festival de Jerez 2005, Caja Madrid 2007 and Seville’s
Flamenco Thursdays 2007. Manuela Carrasco, who is married
to guitarist Joaquín Amador, dares to relate her
baile to Hindu kathak dancing in the show ‘Romalí’,
which is performed at forums such as the festival Andalucía
Flamenca 2007 in Madrid and Seville’s Fundación
Tres Culturas.
