Miguel Poveda, Eva la Yerbabuena, Vicente Amigo, Diego el Cigala, Israel Galván and Argentina will perform this summer at the Festival del Cante de las Minas.
The legendary flamenco tablao El Corral de la Morería, Madrid headquarters of the Cante de las Minas, was the perfect venue chosen by the organization of the Festival Internacional to present this year’s program scheduled to take place August 1st to 11th, with a first-class bill of artists.
The mayor of La Unión, Francisco Bernabé, talked about the project Las Minas Flamenco Tour, which encompasses the international editions of the festival, and which after India in March of 2014, will travel to Japan and the United States. Bernabé said “we are going to franchise our festival at the world level, because flamenco is our most universal manifestation, it’s Spain’s best calling card and it opens all the doors to the world”.
Miguel Ángel Recio pointed out that the festival “never lowered its level of quality”, and cited “its modernization in exporting the event to other countries”. Pedro Alberto Cruz stated that “the Festival de las Minas is the best cultural project for selling Spain, and represents an extraordinary capitalization of flamenco, not as folklore, but an excellent identifying value”. Tourism secretary Isabel Borrego announced the presentation next June 24th and 25th of the Las Minas Flamenco Tour in Brussels and Luxembourg with the objective of “exporting the art of La Unión as the finest tourism symbol of our country”.
The program which was revealed by the mayor, includes the following gala performances: August 1st is the opening day which features a keynote speech by journalist and poet Antonio Lucas, and the presentation in Spain of the group “Flamenco Roots” which came out of the recent trip to India. The winners of last years contest will perform: Ricardo Fernández del Moral (Lámpara Minera), dancer Jesús Carmona (Desplante) and flautist Oscar de Manuel (Filón) will be accompanied on guitar by Antonio Muñoz, winner of the Bordón Minero in 1988, and official guitarist for the festival.
On August 2nd the major shows get underway, the first of which is Eva Yerbabuena’s, followed the next day by Vicente Amigo (August 3rd), Diego el Cigala (4th) and Argentina and Israel Galván (both on the 5th). The closing night show on August 6th is with Miguel Poveda, the artist who this year is being honored by the festival on the 20th anniversary of his great triumph in La Unión when he won the Lámpara Minera at the old public market, now a comfortable theater.
Beginning on the 7th, the Cathedral of Cante will host three consecutive days of contest semifinals for singing, guitar, dance and flamenco instrumentalist, out of which will be chosen the finalists who compete on Saturday the 10th.
The cultural program of the festival includes bullfighter Enrique Ponce, movie director Pablo Berger, chef Juan Mari Arzak and journalist Juan Ramón Lucas, all of whom will receive the Castillete de Oro, the highest institutional honor bestowed by the event. In addition, British ambassador to Spain Timothy Gilles Paxson, will accept the Cathedral del Cante prize for his country’s promotion of flamenco.
The presentation ended with last year’s winner of El Filón, flautist Oscar de Manuel, who offered a spectacular performance to round out the evening.
- Special report 53rd Festival Internacional del Cante de las Minas. Program, tickets, news, cultural agenda, photos, videos.
- Tickets: La Unión town hall, and El Corte Inglés 902400222 www.elcorteingles.es
- Official web of the Festival