Flamenco Festival – Barcelona Music

By Nancy Todd

WHEN? Flamenco stirs the soul and your soul has several options for this rich, traditional Spanish music in Barcelona.   The fifth annual de Cajon Flamenco Festival will tap, twirl and strum until March 25, 2011.  Plan to stay for several performances.  The Scoopettes give you this video of Joachim Cortes, one of flamenco’s sexiest, most famous dancers.  The Scoopometer gives Joachim a 10 for being the sexiest man in Spain.

Music In Barcelona

WHAT IS IT? de Cajon, the name of the Festival, means box.  This is a wooden percussion instrument, box shaped,  that a musician sits on and plays with his/her hands.   Originally pirouetting up from Andalucia, flamenco was the sound of a stick with a lone, single voice.  Modern flamenco has several sounds:  dance, guitar, percussion, and voice.    Performers are diverse in age, often older.  The de Cajon Flamenco Festival will feature an electic mix of traditional deep, scratchy voiced cante jondo meaning ‘deep song,’  to hip hop fusion.   All this is accompanied by complex hand clapping that I can’t begin to wrap around my hands.  Often, the music is so deeply emotional, I get tears.  Women wear flowers in their sleek hair, ruffly dresses with which they flip and flirt.  Men are dressed in black.  A red guitar often makes the scene.

WHERE? For flamenco music in Barcelona, performances will be held in several venues including the Palau de la Musica, one of the richest examples of Art Nouveau architecture in the city.  This passionate, sexy music is subtle but not subtle.  It will grab your heart.  A pause.  A ballet with the fingers and sideways glance.  A provocative tilt of the head.  It is sweet and it is raw.  Move over MTV.  I will be a flamenco dancer in my next life.   www.theproject.es