This Saturday, Dec. 20, the Little Red Church in Comox will be host to a very special music and dance showcase that celebrates local talents and their shared passion for the art of flamenco! Olé!
2014 has been a busy year for Azucena Flamenco, the locally-based trio that has performed at the Victoria Flamenco Festival as well as locally at several different venues and festivals. Azucena Flamenco comprises guitarist Oscar Robles Diaz, vocalist Brittany Bowman, and dancer Tomomi Ozaki, who is a founder and teacher at Comox Valley Flamenco Studio.
“We’ve been working hard! I’m happy to have this opportunity to show my students’ and my dedication to flamenco,” says Ozaki.
At different points throughout the course of the evening, Azucena Flamenco will invite dancers of the CVFS to the stage to show their talents.
“I’m so excited! This is my official debut,” says CVFS student Kerry Griffiths. “I’m even sewing my own flamenco dress to wear for the show.” As well as dancing in a couple of different numbers, Griffiths will be MCing the evening.
Don’t know much about flamenco? Expect exotic rhythms, percussive footwork, floating arms and expressive hands with mesmerizing guitar accompaniment and improvisation, and raw, unrefined emotion turned into song.
Flamenco is the exquisitely passionate, complex and culturally-rich folkloric music and dance forms that Spain is world-famous for. It is said to have birthed in the Middle Ages with the arrival of the Gypsy people in the Andalusian region of Spain. Flamenco occurred as a result of a vibrant musical exchange and cross-pollination that went on between several distinct and very ancient cultures present in Spain at that historic time. As such, Jewish, Arabic, African and Indian roots, as well as influences from the Far and Middle East are often perceptible in flamenco.
Refreshments will be available for sale by the Comox Valley Multicultural Society. Admission at $10. Doors open at 7:30 p.m., and the show kicks off at 8 p.m.
The Little Red Church is located at 2182 Comox Ave. in Comox.
For more information contact Buleria Productions at buleria@live.ca or 250-339-2279.