Israel Galván. 'La edad de Oro'

por Otto Lorenz Böger

Finally
a generation of flamenco-lovers knows and lives a myth of their generation,
the generation that became enthralled with this art in the decade of the
nineteen-nineties.

We’ve had to wait. Now the unforgivable infatuation with a sort
of flamenco which is essentially unknown to us, that of the critics who
took Duende to be at the source of their flamenco feeling and who made
us feel obligated to believe that this or that artist did flamenco in
a given way, is gone forever.

In addition to Israel Galván’s dancing, which is already
quite a mouthful, we can finally afford to contemplate first-hand, the
beginning of a shift. His most recent work, “La Edad de Oro”,
is destined to become, if it is not already, a paradigm.

“La Edad de Oro” brings together three people: a singer,
a guitarist and a dancer, and none of the three leaves the stage at any
moment. They offer a performance which is complete, complex and above
all, flamenco. The show draws a line in the sand which may trigger the
end of those mastodontic productions where flamenco is no more than an
excuse to tell a story. That is era is destined to become dated, and which
most certainly marked an entire generation. An era which began in the
seventies and which has finally begun to expire. How many stories do you
recall of those we’ve been told over the last thirty years? Perhaps
one or another artist is remembered, but seldom what they had to say.
Lorca, Lorca and more Lorca has most often been at the center of flamenco
in the last three decades.

In
“La Edad de Oro” with singer Fernando Terremoto, guitarist
Alfredo Lagos and Israel dancing, they’ve managed to construct a
flamenco show in which Terremoto, a singer more usually seen on his own,
is at no moment interrupted by the needs of the dance. In the fandangos,
to cite just one of the moments when Fernando sings to the dancer, Israel
represents the guitar with his movements. The closing of those fandangos,
that alone will shine as a work of art for time to come.

This dish wasn’t cooked in a day. The same group, but with Niño
Josele, won the Bienal prize in 1996 and toured Andalucía representing
that honor. At that time it was a fortuitous happenstance resulting from
the Bienal prize, mostly because Fernando Terremoto hadn’t sung
for dance.

The current generation of flamenco fans now have their living legend,
and he’s young. It might be the beginning of the kind of nostalgia
that comes between myths, but the kind which must exist…at least it’s
nostalgia of a different sort.