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Cantan Los Fuegos
A Classic Story of Love, Magic and Betrayal
Cantan Los Fuegos Soundtrack now streaming and on CD
A complete recording of the music for Cantan Los Fuegos is now available on iTunes, Spotify, Amazon Music, most other streaming sites and on CD.
VIDEOS
Video excerpts from the 1998 workshop production at ARC Pasadena
About Cantan Los fuegos
Based on Manuel de Falla’s El Amor Brujo, this flamenco jazz ballet updates the classic story of love and betrayal.
In the original version, Carmelo has loved Candela since they were children, but she can never return his love. She is bound to the spirit of her dead husband, José. Cruel and unfaithful in life, he continues to hold her in his grasp. Candela is only free to love Carmelo when Lucia, José's lover in life, agrees to take Candela's place.
In our version, José, is alive and still unfaithful, Candela and Carmelo are still in love, and Lucia still wants José. The community around them, El Circulo Mágico, guides the two couples as they move from the chains of jealousy and betrayal toward the promise of love, passion and celebration.
The seven dancers are accompanied onstage by a flamenco Latin jazz ensemble performing a new score in which the primary themes of the original are deconstructed and rearranged.
About the Dance
When creating the choreography for Cantan los Fuegos, the most important decision was to depart from an essential character in the original version of the story: the ghost of Candela's cruel and unfaithful husband, José. The challenge was to modernize and urbanize this story, leaving the ghost behind to reveal José's character. This change clarified the underlying story, and moved the choreography into a contemporary setting as two sets of lovers with the wrong partner lead everyone into chaos.
For this dance quartet a combination of flamenco, contemporary, modern dance, and jazz fit well in a modern setting. The combination of these strong dance styles reveals the power, sorrow, jealousy and bitter anger of four people that are in love and out of love throughout the piece.
El Círculo Mágico helps to release the two couples from their chains of jealousy and betrayal, moving the quartet towards the promise of love, passion and celebration with brilliant dance expressions of joy, utilizing jazz, Spanish dance, contemporary dance and flamenco.
about the music
The music for Cantan Los Fuegos blends the primary themes from De Falla's El Amor Brujo with elements of flamenco and Latin jazz. The music is meant to evoke the flamenco-based music Miles Davis and John Coltrane created in the early '60s.
These excerpts allow you to compare Falla's original music to the music of Cantan Los Fuegos.
El Amor Brujo
En La Cueva
Juego De Amor
Cantan Los Fuegos
El Aparacido
ABOUT THE PREMIERE
Candela
Carmelo
José
Lucia
Circulo Mágico
Guitar
Percussion
Bass
Beatriz Vasquez
Albertossy Espinoza
Lorenzo Edwards
Masha Balovlenkov
Sonia Ochoa
Jainil Mehta
Alyssa Thompson
Stephen Dick
Johnny Sandoval
Carlos Dominguez
Katerina Tomás
Stephen Dick
Ellen Monocrussous
Ken Meyer
Efrain Valenzuela
Jami Ferreira
Choreography
Composer
Lighting
Set Design
Photography
Videoography
Support
The premiere of Cantan Los Fuegos was funded, in part, through generous contributions from the following patrons of the arts:
Daniel Temianka
Edward Dick
Ken Meyers
Bonnie Lund
Danielle Banon
Nancy Ruyter
Cheryl Cromwell
Adrian Ponce
Dale Mueller
Mark Opshinsky
Scotty Devereaux
Karen Chang
Cathy Galuska-Seidel
Lynn Parkerson
Carmel Hupe
Dunia Handy Gill
Rita Hollingsworth
Joanne McClelland
Peter Krusic
Sherrie Simpson
Susan Swift-Carwin
Cindy Chang
Ana Pineros
We would also like to thank the following arts organizations for their material support:
Center for Cultural Innovation