Text: Pablo San Nicasio
Photos: Annemiek Rooymans
Cante: Carmen Linares Guitar: Salvador Gutiérrez Percussion: Antonio Coronel. & Nederlands Blazers Ensemble
The Dutch Flamenco Biennale 2013 named, selected, anointed…whatever you like, Carmen Linares as resident artist. In other words, you can’t get any more flamenco than in the Netherlands. She is the axis for a program that looks plenty appealing, not only on paper, but in its atmosphere as well.
Coming to Amsterdam is finding the artists right in your hotel, soaking up their experiences, meeting their followers (which they have) and discovering how Ernestina, who runs it all, has given her all to create the perfect setting every two years. Because here, there’s a pre-, a during and a post-concert. With special activities and shows for flamenco fans surrounding each event. Quite a feat. Ernestina ought to take a stroll through the centers of other Iberian mega-events to show them how it’s done.
In the final stretch of the Dutch festival, Carmen Linares brought an experiment in the form of an instrumental arrangement (centered on, but not limited to) wind instruments, and her most poetic creations.
On the stage of the avant-garde Muziekgebouw it was a risky mix. That of a powerful and essentially academic chamber group, the “Nederlands Blazers Ensemble”, each member with his or her music stand and sheet music. And Carmen Linares with her Salvador Gutiérrez and Antonio Coronal, with less on paper, but more flamenco in their heads.
In the legendary series “Rito y Geografía del Cante”, Paco de Lucía said that his experiments were, at first, his mistakes. That was forty years ago, and it’s the premise we’re working with.
And the fact is, anything can happen with experiments, but on this occasion the issue was resolved with some major arrangements and a brilliant selection of repertoire. They knew what they were doing.
