May 21, 2010

I have been too busy to write. I am overloaded with cante classes. Laura gives so much material that I cannot possibly learn it all. Her classes are long and exhausting. Since Stephanie and I cannot take her Monday class because we had previously signed up for Alicia’s class, which happens that day at the same time, Laura has generously been giving us extra time. Last Tuesday we had a three-hour class and then on Thursday we had a two-hour class.
While she is teaching us when to take a breath in the cante, she does not work much with the voice quality, which is what I want. I will not continue after the session is finished. It is too much work and too exhausting. If I were only singing, it would be different, but my priority is dance.
I love Angelita Vargas’s dance class. We are working both on Alegrías and Bulerías. It is challenging and fun. Angelita is a super nice person and very loveable. I have to practice every day; and I am enjoying practicing a lot. I am still taking polishing classes from Lakshmi and that is essential. I will certainly continue with both these classes.
Alicia’s cante classes are once a week for three hours, at the moment, because she is traveling a lot for work (singing). She is helping me to sing from my diaphragm. My tones are improving. I can handle her class. She is very patient and supportive.
Stephanie and I shared a cante/voice class with Carlos but we will not continue that either, although Carlos has some good ideas. Freddie is still studying guitar rehabilitation with Carlos. He enjoys it and feels that it is helping him.
Freddie and I are also both continuing with Juan del Gastor. Juan is fun and we love him and hanging out with him. I am not taking classes as frequently because of money. We are spending a lot of money here this time. Food is more expensive.
Ring, ring-ring! Juan is at the door. So we are all hanging out doing Flamenco instead of me writing. Who can say no to this?
Juan had to go teach a class. I just came back to the computer and am chatting through the Internet with Amit in Santa Cruz, California. Amit is working with Nina to organize workshops in Northern California with Manuela Carrasco. I am sorry I will miss these workshops but I sure love having classes five days a week with Angelita Vargas.
I called Concha Vargas, another of my dance teachers and a good friend, yesterday to wish her happy birthday, but she is still in France, teaching. I had a nice talk with Rafael, her husband. We will visit them after Concha returns on Monday. 
Tonight we are going to Peña Pies Plomo to see Lakshmi perform, here in Sevilla. 

May 22, 2010

Last night Lakshmi gave a beautiful show at Peña Pies Plomo.

Many of our friends were there, including some of the students from Angelita’s dance class. Jill came and so did Teresa Rios, our friend Agustin’s daughter. She is living in Triana and when she wasn’t at the Peña as planned when we arrived I called her. She was tired from a long day but decided to push herself and come anyway. She was glad she did. It was great to see her and she totally enjoyed herself.

The mother of Alicia, our singing teacher, is the president of this Peña and Alicia grew up here, first dancing and then singing. I have written about this before. There are photos of Alicia all over as well as of the great Flamenco legends of Andalucia. Last night Alicia was out of the country working, but her husband Pepe was their with their full-of-fire little four-year old boy. Pepe, who was taking the money at the door, welcomed us and bought Stephanie, Freddie and me drinks. It is a beautiful Peña (community Flamenco club). 
At the end of the show several people were invited up to perform, including me! The woman who announced the show sang and danced. An old man in a beret got up and sang. Another woman from the Peña, who had excellent palmas, danced. Lakshmi’s housemate Basilio danced. A woman wearing shorts danced. I danced last, to the singing of the woman who announced. She sang “La Tana y la Juana” for me, a Bulerías that I have heard for years and just learned to sing in Laura’s cante class.

It was easy for me to dance to it because I knew it so well. Everyone complemented me afterwards and Lakshmi and Freddie said they were proud of me. Freddie took photos but didn’t press the button on the camera hard enough so only one faraway one came out. But Natalia, a Canadian student of Angelita’s, videoed me, and she will bring it over so that I can have it! She showed it to me late that night and it looked good! I hope that some of the other students took photos so that I can post those too. Video: Marianna dancing Bulerías at Peña Pies Plomo, Sevilla May 2010

We stayed late partying at the Peña after the show. A young man, the announcer lady, and the man’s beautiful Italian girlfriend said they would drive us back to the Alameda. But while we were still on the Torneo (a big street that follows the river), they found a parking place and decided to park there, because parking closer to the Alameda on a Friday night is almost impossible. 
So we had to walk much farther than Freddie had anticipated. Just after we started walk we ran into Stephanie, Natalia, Chris, and Josh, who had wanted to walk, instead of taking a taxi, from the Peña. That is where Natalia showed me her video of my dance. Just before our house, they decided to stop at the Flamenco bar nearby and Freddie and I continued on home. Freddie went to straight to bed and I put my photos into the computer. Around 4:30 AM, just after I finally got into bed, Stephanie came home. 
We slept late, of course today. Juan stopped by around noon and we were still in bed, so he left. Stephanie had been up so she answered the door.

Freddie had his guitar lesson with Carlos at 1:00 PM and then went right back to sleep. I washed the smoke (Spain and the Peña) out of my hair and some of my clothes and plan to study my singing for Alicia’s Monday class. I am also writing and editing my Sevilla updates today. And I need to practice my dancing, of course.
Chris stopped by on his way to Laura’s to accompany her singing workout. He sometimes plays for Angelita’s class too. He played for part of my class with Lakshmi yesterday.
This evening I had a very good class with Juan. We worked on cante for an hour and Freddie said that I did very well. I am using my breath as Alicia taught me and it is starting to work. I think that just singing so much in all my classes has actually helped me more than I realize.

After class Freddie and Juan watched “futbol” (soccer) on the TV. I went into the studio/office and practiced. I am starting to be able to separate the Bulerías choreography from the Alegrías choreography. A lot of the steps are similar and I am always mixing them up. But I am making progress. I am still learning Angelita’s vocabulary of dance steps. Some I already know and can do easily, while others I have to work at and repeat a lot to get them into my body memory. I am also learning to make certain of the steps my own, so I can use them anywhere. It is an interesting learning process.
Chris stopped by again on his way home from Laura’s and is storing his guitar and computer here while he visits an Israeli Flamenco guitarist friend of his.

I forget to mention that I fixed my iPhone (old, first generation) myself last Thursday. I have my Spanish telephone sim card in it and use it here in Spain. The phone had suddenly gone dead one morning and its battery would not charge. It had been fine the night before. 
I called the Apple store and they said that they didn’t deal with iPhones and to call Apple itself the next day, as they were already closed. Then I emailed Josh with the question of what to do, although I didn’t really want to bother him. That is his work, after all. But he is the one who first unlocked my phone two years ago and I knew that he would probably know what to do. But Chris told me that Josh was out of town and not checking his email. 
Frustrated, I decided to check online for an answer. After a bit of research, I found two solutions to the problem that sounded good so I tried first one and then the other. They were very similar. And lo and behold, my phone came on again and showed a fully charged battery. It is still working. I am very proud of myself. And it wasn’t really that difficult. 

I hate it when technology goes haywire, but I am “stoked” that I fixed it! I sent another email to Josh telling him to disregard my first request because I had figured it out. When I saw him last night at the Peña, he told me that he had been out of town and had just received my emails! Josh went to Alicia’s cante class last Monday with Stephanie and me. He loved it and signed up. He is another American guitarist who lives here. I wrote about him two years ago. 
Tonight it is late again, but we did have a late start to the day. I think it is time to go to bed. I did send out the last update and I also posted it on Facebook. I hope to have this one up soon, and then I will be up-to-date.