Poetry in Movement (Ramón Rodó Sellés) - María Pagés. News

Flamenco Dance Critic

The best show of flamenco dance in the past years has finally reached our city. After receiving applause half the world over, Sevilla has made the audience of our Liceu vibrate.
María Pagés is a brilliant dancer: her corporal expression is unique; her arm movements are magnificent; her heel tapping is perfect and her sense of timing and her awareness of stage space are unbeatable. But all of this is cannot compare to her soul of an artist, her sensitivity and her expressivity. María has also managed to show us that she knows what she should reveal to her audience, giving them her full potentiality and showing her good taste in choreography, as well as daring with modernity, geniality and tradition.

Sevilla begins with her turning around in continuous motion under the Sevillian moonlight, dancing the Shostakovitch Waltz, ending with these same turning movements, under a starlit sky, dancing Modugno's theme Volare. Between these two scenes, a whole display of references to Sevillia, personal experiences that María has shown she knows how to give shape to, when, as she says "I chose to return to Sevilla with my dream". And this dream of a return to that city gives way to things as beautiful and worthwhile as: the Habanera from Carmen; La Saeta written by Machado and sung by Serrat, a vivid mise-en-scene of Sevillian mysticism; the traditional patio "Sevillanas" and an extraordinary "caracoles" (snail) movement dance; those Banderillas de tinieblas (barbed darts - used in bullfighting - in the darkness) in the Maestranza bullfighting ring, where María Pagés doubles herself, embodying the two main actors in the bullfight ritual; the Soleá movement in "Lunares"; the approach to tangos in "Triana"  the extraordinary choreographic refinement of Volver , in Academy. And after all this there was a standing ovation and long-lasting applause. This performance was a complete success for María Pagés, which she shared with her magnificent male and female dancers and her musicians, in a show that we can only describe as true poetry in movement.
 

Ramón Rodó Sellés