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<\/p>\n-Grandpa, there is an artist who admires and follows you, the dancer and choreographer Antonio Alonso, born in Madrid but now living for many years in Tokyo (Japan), where he has done a fantastic job. Both his professional and personal careers have a lot of merit. He\u2019s a fighter and an artist from head to toe.<\/b><\/p>\n
-Oh! Anto\u00f1ito Alonso! Merceditas Le\u00f3n, daughter of Frasquillo and La Quica, did a pretty good job teaching him. You should have seen Mercedes\u2019 grace when she danced. His mother was a great dancer, too.<\/p>\n
-Grandpa, I\u2019ve seen him dance many times, but I remember one time in particular, when Mario Maya\u2019s\u00a0Requiem<\/i>\u00a0premiered for the\u00a0Compa\u00f1\u00eda Andaluza de Danza<\/i>. Diego Lori also performed, and that was just spectacular. The image of Antonio\u2019s dramatic strength remained etched in my mind for many months.<\/b><\/p>\n
-Antonio is one of the great artists of Spanish dance. I\u2019ve seen him dance\u00a0El sombrero de tres picos<\/i>\u00a0and\u00a0La farruca del molinero<\/i>, y both were delightful.\u00a0Zapateado<\/i>, too, with music by Pablo Sarasate and choreographed by Antonio Ruiz Soler. The history of the\u00a0Ballet Nacional de Espa\u00f1a<\/i>\u00a0could not be conceived without this artist of dance and flamenco.<\/p>\n
-These days we have to be careful about what is and isn\u2019t flamenco, grandpa, we may get in trouble.<\/b><\/p>\n
-Look, Manolito, before flamenco, the \u201carte jondo<\/i>\u201d, even existed, Spanish dance had already captivated the whole world. I\u2019m referring to the days of the\u00a0escuela bolera<\/i>, in the middle of the 19th century, with revolutionary artists such as La Nena, Petra C\u00e1mara, her husband Maestro Guerrero and Francisco Ruiz. That was the Spanish or Andalusian dance, because the other dance, Gypsy, so-called flamenco, was kind of hidden, as it was an art belonging to some families in Lower Andalusia from Triana, Jerez, C\u00e1diz, El Puerto, Lebrija or Utrera. El Maestro and \u00c1ngel Pericet, among others, draw a lot from that school, and from that mixture between\u00a0escuela bolero<\/i>\u00a0and Gypsy dance, came out flamenco, the dance which got in the\u00a0caf\u00e9s cantantes<\/i>\u00a0of El Burrero and Silverio. Separating flamenco from traditional Spanish dance is not easy. I\u2019ve seen Antonio Alonso dancing a\u00a0farruca<\/i>, for example, and it was a first-class flamenco performance. He has an incredible technique, and without a good technique, Manolito, it\u2019s impossible to master any type of dance.<\/p>\n
-Do you know why he ended up in Japan, and why he is still there?\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n
-Yes, of course. He performed in Japan in the 1980s, and he liked it so much that he decided to settle in that country. He moved to Japan in 1997, thinking he would live there a couple of years, but his life took a few turns. He opened an studio in Tokyo\u2019s Roppongi district that same year, having almost 40 students, and he fell in love with one of his students. What a beautiful story. He is still there. More than 10,000 students have been trained in his studio, it\u2019s a very important school of Spanish dance, including flamenco, of course. Antonio is already a full-fledged Japanese, without a doubt. He has a Japanese daughter, by his wife. The life of this artist is worth of a movie.<\/p>\n
-Grandpa, don\u2019t you think it\u2019s rather unfair that artists such as Antonio Alonso and others who work overseas are all but forgotten in Spain? He has taught thousands of dancers from Japan and from other countries. He has produced more than twenty shows and created more than sixty choreographies for flamenco\u00a0palos<\/i>. Such accomplishments should be acknowledged in Spain, shouldn\u2019t they?<\/b><\/p>\n
-Without a doubt, Manolito. We talked about Antonio Alonso, but there are many Spanish artists all over the world who are doing a great job. When we see so many foreigners at the\u00a0Bienal<\/i>\u00a0festival, that\u2019s in great measure thanks to the work of Antonio and other artists in places like Italy, Germany or the USA.<\/p>\n
-Antonio had great success with the premiere of The Tokyo Flamenco Ballet, where all\u00a0bailaoras<\/i>\u00a0are Japanese, and half of the musicians are from Japan. When he was preparing the premier, he was diagnosed with a serious illness and the project was put on hold. Fortunately, he beat his cancer and the premiere was a huge success. That is, grandpa, the work of Antonio has a lot of merit and that should be recognized in Spain.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n
-Let\u2019s hope that one day his work is acknowledged, yes.<\/p>\n
-What\u2019s for lunch, grandpa?\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n
-Potatoes and Brussel sprouts.<\/p>\n
-What the heck is that? Do you have anything against seabass?\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n
-You can ask Rajoy, the Prime Minister, all about the sorry state of the Spanish economy.<\/p>\n
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-Grandpa, there is an artist who admires and follows […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":10418,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog-archivo"],"yoast_head":"\n