Music and Moves: Flamenco En Rouge presents Luna Flamenca

There will be a new moon in the sky as Flamenco En Rouge takes to the stage of the Company House on Sept. 30 and Oct. 1 to present its new show, Luna Flamenca.

“Our show will be pure, raw gypsy flamenco,” says Martine Durier-Copp, one of the dancers and the choreographer of Flamenco En Rouge. “It’s come down to us via an oral tradition and many of us return to our teachers in Jerez de la Frontera and Algeciras (Spain) year after year.”

In many ways, there are correlations between this show and a traditional Celtic kitchen party on Cape Breton Island — a celebration of traditions handed down from generation to generation, combining songs, spoken word, poetry and the passionate, raw emotion of the dance.

Flamenco is an expressive, rhythmically complex dance that grew out of traditions that include Celtic, Roma (Gypsy), Sephardic and Arabic, among others in Spain. A flamenco performance consists of cante (singing), toque (guitar), palmas (handclaps) and, of course, baile (dancing). Even today, this form of dance varies from region to region and town to town in Spain, and there is no one ‘official manual’ for Flamenco dance.

In addition to the eight dancers and musicians of Flameco En Rouge, the company will be joined by visiting Cantora and Bailaora, Irena Dumicz, from Edmonton and Jacqueline Warwick, from the Fountain School of Performing Arts at Dalhousie University.

“Jacqueline Warwick has translated poet Federico Garcia Lorca’s Romanceros Gitanos (Gypsy Romances) into English that will resonate with a Nova Scotian audience and will read from it,” Durier Copp says. “It’s very heady, emotional poetry that talks about how the moon influences feelings and passion.”

Audience members are guaranteed an evening that is extremely interactive. Durier-Copp says it is typical for audiences to respond to the artists and the artists will respond in kind. It’s not an evening where people sit politely and watch the performance; everyone, performers and audience alike, get caught up in the swirling rhythms of the music, dance, and poetry.

“During our shows our audience will eat, drink and shout things at us and we will respond — just as they would at a traditional kitchen party,” she said.

Because of its nature, appealing to all of the human emotions (often within one show), Flamenco has been named as a Universal World Heritage by UNESCO.

Luna Flamenca (sponsored by the National Bank of Canada) will be performed at The Company House, 2202 Gottingen St., at 8 p.m. Tickets for Luna Flamenca are $20 in advance and $25 on the evening of the performance and are available through tickethalifax.com or by calling 902-237-4484.