“Her name has always been a part of
my life. First it was my mother always telling me about her…how
she danced, what a good person she was. Even now at eighty
she still talks about how she came on stage, that majestic
presence, that temperament, her electrifying personality.
She had everything. There’ll never be another.
“And the woman…that humanity she had
that made her special. My family lived in Somorrostro, where
Carmen was born, so they were neighbors. My older sister tells
how she performed in the theater in Barcelona…all the tickets
were sold out and many gypsies from Somorrostro couldn’t
get in, either because they couldn’t afford it or because
there were no tickets left. When Carmen found out, she went
right to the neighborhood and danced for her ‘gitanicos’”. Dolores Giménez, president and founder of
the Asociación Cultural Flamenca de Madrid.
On
November 19th, 1963, a few days before U.S. President John
Kennedy was assassinated, Carmen Amaya died in Begur (Girona).
That was forty years ago, ninety since her birth. But the
collective memory of this person and her dance continue to
be absolutely current for the new generation of flamenco dancers
– stars like Antonio Canales, Juana Amaya, Juan Andrés
Maya and José Antonio himself of Spain’s National
Ballet who just premiered his work “Leyenda” based
on Carmen Amaya, continue to find inspiration in this petite
individual who transformed flamenco dance for good.
Deflamenco wishes to pay tribute to Carmen by declaring the
month of November “Carmen Amaya Month”. We won’t
go over the details of her biography, for that there are magnificent
books such as “Queen of the Gypsies” (Sevilla
Press, 1999) by Paco Sevilla, “Carmen Amaya o la Danza
del Fuego” (Espasa Calpe, 1994) by Mario Bois, “Cuando
duermo, sueño que estoy bailando” (Libros PM,
1995) by Francisco Hidalgo Gómez or “Carmen Amaya
la bailaora genial” (G.P. Barcelona, 1964) by Salvador
Montañés, just to name a few, but rather, through
the words of people who worked and lived with her, we hope
to reconstruct a vivid impression of who this person really
was and peel away the layers of myth to feel her presence.
Throughout this month of November we shall be offering these
intimate testimonies.
“That’s how we all ought to live, doing
everything as if our life depended on it, as if we might die
at any moment”. Antonio Canales, flamenco dancer,
speaking about Carmen Amaya in an interview by Flamenco-world.
