España in New York

Get ready to transport to the New York of the 1920s and 1930s, where you found illustrious Spanish artists and intellectuals, many in exile, leading to some great collaborations and creative explorations.

The concert features classical Spanish music and dance from that era, a time when the Spanish intelligentsia connected with American liberalism, women’s emancipation, and democracy. During that time in the United States, everything Spanish was in vogue.  American audiences could not get enough of Spanish art, architecture, music, and dance. It is in this environment that we find poet Federico García Lorca and dancers, Antonia Mercé, La Argentina and Encarnación López, La Argentinita. Close to 100 years later, this concert aims to recreate, reconstruct, and interpret the work of these great artists.

From June 1929 to March 1930, the great Spanish poet and playwright, Federico García Lorca, visited New York.  The main tangible legacy of that trip is a book of poems titled Poet in New York. Lorca had found a kindred spirit in dancers La Argentina and La Argentinita and his time in New York coincided with some of their performances. They all looked at the mixed heritage of Andalusia in their work and gave voice to rebellion to the social and political order with their work. They mesmerized New York audiences with their modernist aesthetic and their rhythmic sensitivies. Their voices were understood in the New York of the 1920s and 30s, and I argue that they hold relevance today. España in New York  weaves elements of both Andalusian and New York landscapes through classical Spanish dance, song and music.