REVIEWS
"A troupe like the Paco Peña Dance Company comes along as a reminder that great art can make a home for itself anywhere. From Mr. Peña's fierce leadership at the guitar to the regal, smoldering dancing of Ángel Muñoz, one of the more magnificent performers I've seen in recent memory. There was always something to delight in, including the light dexterity of the percussionist Nacho Lopez, or the earthy, mournful singing of Miguel Ortega and Inmaculada Rivero."
Claudia La Rocco, The New York Times, April 2, 2007
"There was most definitely a beautiful display of flamenco tradition on stage. World-Class Master Flamenco Guitarist Paco Peña [along with] guitarists Paco Arriaga & Rafael Montilla’s skillful fingering, all melt into the sound of one guitar. Ángel Muñoz & Charo Espino dance so exquisitely. Separately, they are masterful performers. Together, they produce an intense, slow burn that few contemporary performers either seek to perform or if attempting to perform, can achieve... The show left the audience gasping for more. I was totally enraptured for the ENTIRE show, no wandering of mind, no fidgeting, just pure devotion the elegant offering that was ¡A Compás! Flawless!"
Damaris "La Gata" Solis, FlamencoBuzz.com, March 29, 2007
"Passion smoldered, interspersed with outbursts of playfulness, abandon and ferocity, all fueled by the pulsing rhythms of guitarists, a drummer and singers."
Margaret Putnam, The Dallas Morning News, May 1, 2007
"Welcome Return by Flamenco Ensemble: Two years was a long time to wait for the Paco Peña Flamenco Dance Ensemble to come back to Philadelphia. But the troupe was as wonderful as I'd remembered and once again left the audience screaming with excitement."
Nancy G. Heller,The Inquirer, Philadelphia, January 29, 2008
“Paco Peña’s program of flamenco guitar music was extraordinary in several respects. Mr. Peña is a genuine virtuoso, capable of dazzling an audience with technical abilities beyond the frets of mortal man. He combines rapid-fire flourishes with a colorists’s sense of shading. This listener cannot recall hearing any guitarist with a more assured mastery of his instrument. The capacity audience rewarded him not only with several sustained ovations, but with an involuntary gasp of delight upon the conclusion of every piece.”
Tim Page, The New York Times
“Paco Peña May will be the most universally respected flamenco guitarist working today. In successful flamenco performances, the tensions between presentation and creation must ultimately be resolved in favor of the latter, as they were when Peña and friends presented ‘Flamenco in Concert.’ The guitar playing of the Peña and the Losada Brothers cut its own inventive, furious swath. Singer Angel Gabarre demonstrated that power and passion need not preclude intelligibility or tonal warmth. There were castanets, plenty of sultry poses, and enough massed strumming to power a week of Gipsy Kings concerts.”
John Henken, Los Angeles Times
“Paco Peña is to the guitar what Stephane Grappelli is to the violin: a living legend whose talent draws huge crowds around the world. ‘Flamenco in Concert’ at Toronto’s Massey Hall was typically a standing-room-only event. The maestro’s deft playing of the Spanish guitar, a sonorous instrument that in his hands seems capable of shedding tears of both joy and despair, was a thrilling spectacle. Peña’s sensational two-hour show captures the most brilliant Spanish dancing to click across a Toronto stage.”
Deirdre Reilly, The Globe and Mail, Toronto
“The combination of discipline and control with the constant undercurrent of passionate emotion has helped to make Peña one of the premier flamenco guitarists in the world. Peña plays with a remarkable palette of colors, from the gentlest of whispers to a robust warmth to the bravura flourishes. When he was joined by three other guitarists (the talented Losada brothers), the music became slightly more extroverted. The show's real fireworks came when the two dancers took the stage.”
Karen Campbell, Boston Herald
“After the success of his last production, Paco Peña has returned to London, this time for a month, with ‘Musa Gitana,’ his latest show. Javier Latorre's choreography is unprecedented in flamenco for its innovation. This is flamenco at its finest - modern, sophisticated and tantalizing.”
Evening Standard, London
“Peña's playing, too, was a marvel of beauty and authority. He opened the show alone bathed in light, hugging his guitar so only his head appeared over it. His plucking and strumming evoked exquisite scenery and dreamy breezes.”
Laura Bleiberg, The Orange County Register, Costa Mesa, CA
“The Paco Peña Flamenco Dance Company simmered with a smoldering passion that reached the boiling point yet never erupted into self-aggrandizing showmanship Friday night at the Cleveland Museum of Art. The ensemble's harsh singing, rhythmic clapping, flavorful guitar music and defiant dancing communicated the essence of the earthy art form from the Spanish region of Andalusia.”
Wilma Salisbury, Plain Dealer, Cleveland, OH
“At last a flamenco show worthy of London and of the extended season it was given. Peña's company of excellent dancers flowed in and out of the seamless dances. Visually it was a most satisfying whole. As usual, the excellent musicians, guitarists Tito Losada, Vaky Losada and Diego Losada, led by Paco Peña, and singer Angel Gabarre, added to this memorable evening.”
The Dancing Times, London
"A splendid program presided over the el maestro himself, Paco Peña. Peña has a complete command of the flamenco idiom, playing with great freedom while remaining true to the traditional forms. He was joined by the three Losada brothers, Tito, Vaki and Diego. Their collective performance with Paco Peña is a pulsating web of sound, with simmering undercurrents of passion, explosive accents, dramatic pauses, and seemingly inexhaustible energy. The intense singing of Angel Gabarre perfectly complemented the music. Completing the performance was the magnificent dancing of Angel Muñoz and Belen Fernandez. Mesmerizing!”
Stephen Whittington, Australia
“The emphasis on the musical content makes this a particularly varied, interesting and sensitive program of flamenco. There is passion here, but it is just as likely to be conveyed with elegance and subtlety. With four guitarists, two dancers, and one singer, the viewer is drawn in by the high calibre of the music and dance, the commitment and genuine zest with which they are performed.”
Jill Sykes, Australia
“Setting the packed Concert Hall on fire, renowned flamenco exponent Paco Peña led his tight-knit, six-member ensemble through an electrifying program of music, song and dance.”
Naomi Millett, Australia
“From [Peña’s] opening solo onward, the guitarist captivated with a personalized style by turns graceful – as in his creamy vibrato – and explosive. What distinguishes his playing is a sense of maturity and rightness, of gesture, repose, and degrees of intensity, the key ingredients in flamenco expression.”
Josef Woodard, The Independent, Santa Barbara, CA
“Though he’s a master of the driving blood-on-the-sand drama of flamenco, [Peña] also has a fine lyrical touch and a penchant for a kid of baroque impressionism, alongside his knack of producing for more notes that one pair of hands would seem capable of playing.”
Adam Sweating, The Guardian, London
“…Beautiful, powerful and expressive… The tradition is honoured, the improvisation convincing, the virtuosity dazzling, but the communication remains paramount. You feel part of such a performance, not a spectator of it.”
Jennifer Shennan, The Wellington Post, New Zealand
“[Peña] performed on solo guitar, skillfully and seamlessly manipulating the strings as if he was tugging at heartstrings, sounding like a scratchy record at times and a tinkling chandelier at others, even tickling the strings into melodious rippling water.”
Anita Anandarajah, New Straits Times, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
“Simply wonderful… The show was not only passionately authentic, but warm with humour and bursting with rhythmic energy.”
Sharmila Vella, The Malay Mail, Malaysia
“They all love their art, it's obvious, and they respect each other, and their enjoyment of it embraces us.”
Ismene Brown, The Telegraph, London
“Ranging from a rehearsal studio, where everyone is now in casual contemporary clothes, to inventive, intricate, tightly wrought production numbers, this is flamenco on fast-forward. The dazzlingly diverse dancers extend the format, expand the vocabulary, push the envelope… Now flamenco is daring to move on, open up, explore exciting new roads.”
Allen Robertson, The Times of London
“The Paco Peña Flamenco Dance Company crackled with the spontaneity of improvisation and the razor-sharpness of disciplined artistry… Pena, the Spanish master of flamenco guitar, played solos that were beautifully embellished and sensuously shaped. He also blended easily into the closely knit ensemble. ‘A Compás’ was all about rhythm: the trancelike pulse of songs, the shifting meters of dances, the throbbing energy of guitars, the driving beat of cajon, the sudden outbursts of hand-clapping.”
Wilma Salisbury, The Plain Dealer
“[Peña’s] purity as an artist is real, but that he is much more than the guardian of flamenco is also obvious. In him, and in his hand-picked entourage, we have the future of the form.”
Deborah Meyers, Vancouver, Canada
“Paco Peña’s artistry resonates not just with flamenco aficionados, but with an ever-expanding audience around the world. Peña and his troupe of singers, dancers and musicians exude a powerful magnetism that gleams with vitality and – in Peña’s current show – underlines the utterly contemporary nature of this archetypal Spanish art form. At its core, any show by Peña is a reflection of the rich culture and emotional depths from which flamenco emerged. In his hands (and those of his remarkable troupe), the heartfelt cry of an unaccompanied voice, the eloquent arch of a dancer’s spine or the exquisite delicacy of a guitar solo can contain all the spirit of flamenco’s mysterious world.”
Jessica Nicholas, The Age, Slippery Rock, PA
“We do not have reviewers at Clemson; however, their performance was phenomenal. I just went out to dinner and someone who was in the audience came up to me and raved about the performance. Our audience was wildly
enthusiastic about the evening. It was a wonderful experience!!! And they were such delightful people as well.”
Lillian Harder, director, Brooks Center, Clemson University
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