La Ronde des Lutins! (The Goblin's Dance)

Look at those fingers fly!

No! I DON'T think I can dance!

Well, I can definitely dance better than Elaine! But certainly not as well as the the very talented young dancers on "So You Think You Can Dance." Check out this story on the show that aired today on Morning Edition.

I've been a fan of this show since the beginning, when I watched it with my 16 year old host daughter from Mexico in the summer of 2005. Aiddy reminds me of one of this years dancers Sara. She is a "B-girl," a girl that dances hip-hop that includes breaking, locking and popping. Locking and popping? What in the world is that? Well, watch and find out!



The idea of the show is to take dancers from diverse backgrounds and specialities, pair them up, throw just about every kind of dance style at them and see what happens! You learn a lot about dance from watching the program. Firstly, it's hard work. Secondly, dance choreographers are a little like Bach and Handel. They simply don't care what they do do your body (or in the case of Bach and Handel your vocal cords), they care about their vision of the dance (or in the case of Bach and Handel about their vision of the music). You are but an instrument in their orchestra of movement.

Mia Michaels seems to expect the dancers to throw themselves on the stage, across the stage and at each other with wild abandon and no concern whatsoever for their physical well being. Exciting stuff but when it beats up 20 somethings you know it's difficult.

I like this choreographer, Jean Marc Genereux and not just because he's French!
He choreographed a great swing/jive/jitterbug routine with the entire cast and anyone who does that automatically wins points in my book. That was and is a great style of dance. What did we do in high school? Well, remember Billy Crystal in "When Harry Met Sally" talking about the "white man's overbite?" That was pretty much it. BORING.



This young man, Ricky, was one of the first dancers voted out and I almost quit watching because of it. He was an amazing dancer with a presence that was so unique and interesting. What a shame. They kept a break dancer on instead of him and that dancer, Cedric, was eventually eliminated. I still think that Ricky would have been in at least the top five.













On the other hand, here is a beautiful dancer who has had trouble connecting with the audience until just recently.













And here is a picture of me dancing "Swan Lake:......NOT! I'm afraid, my dear Northwest Public Radio listeners that you are simply not strong enough to bear the site. However, I do have a picture of the Pastor at my church dancing in a memorable performance of "Swine Lake." Hmmmm......Perhaps I can persuade him to send me a photo?

Eduardo Serrano Iglesias, El Güito

Have you heard of this man? Well,it may interest you to know that in the 1960's he won the Sarah Bernhardt prize, recognizing him as the best dancer of his day. Who was his competition? None other than Rudolf Nureyev!

While in Madrid we went to one of the performances of the Suma Flamenca, a festival celebrating the oh-so-Spanish art of flamenco dancing.

The concert we went to on May 9th featured El Guito, a legend in flamenco dance. You simply have to read this interview with him at flamenco-world. The story of his first performance at age five is the stuff of legend!

This was my first, live experience of flamenco. Laure told me that most people either love it or hate it. I loved it! The concert started with two men standing on an empty stage dressed all in black. The spotlight shone on one of the men and he started singing, a capella, a song of immense feeling and passion. He put his whole body into this song and even though I didn't understand a word of it I was caught up in the feeling. Such is the power of music!

The spotlight then fell on another man and he took his turn singing and then they sang together. The stage went dark for a few moments. When the lights came back on these two men were seated at the back of the stage with two others; with three guitarists seated next to them. All were dressed in black.

They performed together, separately and in various groups. The guitarists were amazing and I'm disappointed that I lost my program and cannot, therefore, credit their outstanding performance.

I really appreciated the fact that there were no props, no set decorations and no fancy lighting. Just superb singers,one of whom sounded like the lead singer to the Gypsy Kings, guitarists and dancers.

And the dancers? Amazing! Beginning, of course, with El Guito himself. He walked onto the stage in tight black pants, a blousy black shirt with a black cummerbund and he was instantly commanding. At the time I thought that he was 60. After doing some research on the Internet I discovered that he is actually 65, which made his performance even more impressive! El Guito is particularly known for his expertise in the solea and farruca.

Laure told me that the audience would probably cry out his nickname, "El Guito," and other names for him during the concert. For me, this added to the performance. I always think that this idea of holding your applause until the end to be a bit constipated. I realize that there are moments when this is important but sometimes I think that it's good to let loose and really join in the moment!

There were two female dancers as well who danced both individually, together and with El Guito. It was truly an outstanding evening.