Flamenco

MADRID -- Jose Antonio Diaz Fernandez, or "Chaqueton," one of Madrid's well-known flamenco singers, died Dec. 29 of cancer in a local clinic, the newspaper El Pais reported Wednesday. Chaqueton, or "Big Jacket," was 58. "He was a great singer, of a very deep and rough voice," El Pais flamenco critic Angel Alvarez Cabellero wrote. "Chaqueton lived dedicated exclusively to singing. " Born in 1945 in the southern town of Algeciras, he was descended from a dynasty of flamenco singing called "los chaqueta," or jackets.

DANCE FEVER: Joppa Dance presents its annual spring showcase Sunday in two shows at the Firehouse Center for the Arts in Newburyport. "Fools for Dance" features new choreography by directors Fontaine Dubus, Jen Steeves, and Cheryl Schwind, as well as new modern and ballet pieces by Pam Smith. It also showcases student choreography, with styles ranging from lyrical to hip-hop. Music selections include Cold Play, Ani DiFranco, and Louis Armstrong. Joppa Dance, based at The Dance Place in Newburyport, was founded in the 1980s...

There is one stunning moment in Isabel Bayón's flamenco "play" "La Puerta Abierta" in which time seems to stand still. Right in the midst of Bayón's foot-stomping, skirt-flashing Alegria, the lights suddenly dim, the musicians freeze in place, and the raw joy of the dance is cut short by a keening voice from afar that embodies the pain and heartache of flamenco's long Andalusian tradition. Bayón's public mask of bravado dissolves into personal anguish - a hand to her heart, shoulders slumped, face etched in sorrow.

Miles Davis has been covered and covered and covered, especially the tunes from his 1959 masterpiece, "Kind of Blue. " Chano Dominguez's project, however, is unlike any other. His new Blue Note album, "Flamenco Sketches," re-interprets all five songs from "Kind of Blue," plus two other Davis compositions, "Nardis" and "Serpent's Tooth. " The Spanish pianist uses them as the basis for explorations that blend jazz and flamenco - an interesting notion, given that 1.) Davis did this on "Sketches of Spain," the follow-up to "Kind of Blue," and 2.)

"Death is looking at me/ from the towers of Córdoba. " Those lines from Federico García Lorca could be the epigraph to "Rosa, metal y ceniza," the show from Cordoban bailaora Olga Pericet that concluded World Music/CRASHarts' weekend Flamenco Festival Sunday at the Cutler Majestic Theatre. Pericet has explained her title - "Rose, Metal and Ash" - as a journey from femininity to strength and rhythm, and then finally renewal and transformation. But this was a show that didn't readily give up its secrets.

MADRID — One of Spain’s top flamenco singers, Enrique Morente, has died. He was 67. Madrid’s La Luz Hospital said Mr. Morente died yesterday but did not specify the cause. The singer’s family said earlier yesterday that Mr. Morente was brain dead after slipping into a coma last week. Admired for his constant efforts to modernize and innovate flamenco, Mr. Morente was the first flamenco artist to receive the Culture Ministry’s National Music Award, in 1994. He was married to dancer Aurora Carbonell.

The art form of flamenco may be centuries old, but guitarist Paco Peña and his talented company of dancers and musicians make it seem completely of the moment, bringing a contemporary sensibility and riveting immediacy to the tradition. In “A Compás!,’’ presented at the Berklee Performance Center on Sunday, three guitarists (including Peña), two singers, a percussionist, and three dancers treated the crowd to a show highlighting the rich variety of rhythms in flamenco, from the simple, almost tribal pulse of the alboreá to complex tapestries of rhythmic counterpoint.

You suspect you're not seeing a run-of-the-mill flamenco performance when Rafaela Carrasco begins her routine in sleek black leather pants and shoes of fire-engine red. Your suspicion is confirmed when her four male partners — brimming with machismo, all of them — come out in shimmering, silvery flamenco skirts with dramatic trains. The role reversal doesn't feel gimmicky, though — it's just plain entertaining, and impressive. Those long flamenco skirts aren't just for show, after all: They must be navigated in the choreography, with...

When Julian Erskine last saw the American touring company of "Riverdance," he had to smile. He was in the Segerstrom Center for the Arts on an October night in Costa Mesa, Calif., watching the high-stepping cast electrify the crowd once again despite more than a dozen years crisscrossing the nation. "To be at the back of a hall with the audience jumping to their feet at the end of the show after all these years, it's just so gratifying and just so pleasing," says Erskine, the show's senior executive producer, by phone from Dublin.

The dancers and musicians of Spain's Noche Flamenca vividly capture what makes the pure flamenco style so immediately and viscerally powerful -- that sense of raw spontaneous invention within a centuries-old tradition unfurling totally in the moment, uncontrived, and unfettered. Yet despite the cohesion of convention, the troupe's four dancers display remarkable individuality. Noche Flamenca's star, Soledad Barrio, is a earth goddess. Eyes raised, she is summoning the spirits. Eyes downcast, she is plumbing the depths of her soul.

"Death is looking at me/ from the towers of Córdoba. " Those lines from Federico García Lorca could be the epigraph to "Rosa, metal y ceniza," the show from Cordoban bailaora Olga Pericet that concluded World Music/CRASHarts' weekend Flamenco Festival Sunday at the Cutler Majestic Theatre. Pericet has explained her title - "Rose, Metal and Ash" - as a journey from femininity to strength and rhythm, and then finally renewal and transformation. But this was a show that didn't readily give up its secrets.

You suspect you're not seeing a run-of-the-mill flamenco performance when Rafaela Carrasco begins her routine in sleek black leather pants and shoes of fire-engine red. Your suspicion is confirmed when her four male partners — brimming with machismo, all of them — come out in shimmering, silvery flamenco skirts with dramatic trains. The role reversal doesn't feel gimmicky, though — it's just plain entertaining, and impressive. Those long flamenco skirts aren't just for show, after all: They must be navigated in the choreography, with expert kicks and turns.

In 1931, His Master's Voice released a recording of Spanish folk songs that Federico García Lorca had collected and rewritten, with his friend La Argentinita singing, stamping, and playing castanets, and García Lorca himself at the piano for most of them. The refrain of "Anda jaleo" ends with the line "Vamos al tiroteo": "Let's get on with the shooting. " In 1936, it was Franco's Nationalists who got on with the shooting, arresting García Lorca and executing him. Now, however, these songs have found new life in Compañía Rafaela Carrasco's "Vamos a tiroteo,"...

When Julian Erskine last saw the American touring company of "Riverdance," he had to smile. He was in the Segerstrom Center for the Arts on an October night in Costa Mesa, Calif., watching the high-stepping cast electrify the crowd once again despite more than a dozen years crisscrossing the nation. "To be at the back of a hall with the audience jumping to their feet at the end of the show after all these years, it's just so gratifying and just so pleasing," says Erskine, the show's senior executive producer, by phone from Dublin.

POP & ROCK QUILT Still riding high from 2011, which saw the release of a solid debut that garnered national attention, this local trio splits the difference between shimmering guitar pop and 1960s psychedelic folk. Jan. 12, 9 p.m. Tickets: $10. Great Scott. 617-566-9014, www.ticketweb.com THE REMAINS Half the rock bands around town owe a debt to the Remains, which was one of the first major acts to emerge from Boston's music scene in the mid-1960s. Still led by the dynamic Barry Tashian, the original lineup is reuniting for this show, in addition to its...

Having nothing to do with Aerosmith, it’s been a busy year for Steven Tyler . The flamboyant frontman has been a fixture on TV since becoming a judge on “American Idol,’’ and his memoir, “Does the Noise in My Head Bother You?,’’ is a New York Times Bestseller. Not bad. Last night, Tyler was at the House of Blues with girlfriend Erin Brady to celebrate his new single, “(It) Feels So Good,’’ and to mingle with the masthead of Boston Common magazine, which is putting his puffy lips on the cover of the October issue.

Reprinted from late editions of yesterday's Globe. The dancers and musicians of Spain's Noche Flamenca vividly capture what makes the pure flamenco style so immediately and viscerally powerful -- that sense of raw, spontaneous invention within a centuries-old tradition unfurling totally in the moment, uncontrived and unfettered. Yet despite the cohesion of convention, the troupe's four dancers display remarkable individuality. Noche Flamenca's star, Soledad Barrio, is an earth goddess.

Hoofing sensation Savion Glover is also an on-the-spot composer-musician-instrumentalist par excellence who bangs out crackling, intricate scores with his size 12EE feet. Pair his “Hooferz’’ style with the raw emotion of flamenco, as he did Saturday in his new “SoLo iN TiME,’’ and you’ve got a steamy call-and-response, an acoustic dialogue that catapults you out of your seat. The intermission-less show has 12 pieces, with names such as “Blue Afro’z’’ and “Craneos en el Mar.’’ It’s often tough to tell where one leaves off and the next begins, but no matter:...

MADRID — One of Spain’s top flamenco singers, Enrique Morente, has died. He was 67. Madrid’s La Luz Hospital said Mr. Morente died yesterday but did not specify the cause. The singer’s family said earlier yesterday that Mr. Morente was brain dead after slipping into a coma last week. Admired for his constant efforts to modernize and innovate flamenco, Mr. Morente was the first flamenco artist to receive the Culture Ministry’s National Music Award, in 1994. He was married to dancer Aurora Carbonell.