Flamenco Latino to Present Panel Discussion: THE NATURE OF COMBINING FLAMENCO, TAP, AND HIP HOP

Flamenco Latino will present a free Panel Discussion with a Q&A: "The Nature of Combining Flamenco, Tap, and Hip-Hop" on Wednesday, August 14, 2024, 7:30pm - 8:30pm at The Secret Theatre, 38-02 61st St, Woodside NY 11377. The free panel, featuring Aurora Reyes, Basilio Georges, Omar Edwards and Paige Stewart is a part of Flamenco Latino's 2024 Más Allá Series, which runs from Wednesday, July 24 to Saturday, August 24, 2024. The annual Más Allá ("Way Beyond") Series, which has been a part of Flamenco Latino since 2015, represents the company's most creative, innovative offering within the world of Flamenco dance and music. For tickets, visit https://www.eventbrite.com/e/2024-mas-alla-series-panel-discussion-with-core-artists-tickets-934225382267?aff=oddtdtcreator. For more information, visit flamencolatino.com.

Flamenco Latino's 2024 Más Allá Series is made possible (in part) with public funds from the Queens Arts Fund, a re-grant program supported by New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council and administered by New York Foundation for the Arts.

About the Artists

Aurora Reyes is a dancer, choreographer, singer, and co-founder & artistic director of Flamenco Latino who has been dancing flamenco for 40 years and choreographing for 23 years. Her Spanish heritage, of Valencian and Galician descent, originally drew her to flamenco, and she has performed in both Spain and New York. Aurora's extensive collaboration with composer and singer Basilio Georges has produced flamenco heelwork, which authentically replicates the rhythms played in Latin music by the congas, bongos and timbales. As the primary choreographer of Flamenco Latino's repertoire, Ms. Reyes' work fuses her wide knowledge of traditional flamenco with dancers and musicians of diverse traditions. Ms. Reyes' choreography of the flamenco mambo El Yoyo fused traditional steps from both idioms in collaboration with company member Yvonne Gutierrez, and was performed at The Duke Theatre on 42nd Street in 2002. She set Danzón choreography and commissioned renowned Salsa dancer/choreographer Eddie Torres to set the Mambo-Cha section that she adapted for Mas Allá que el Danzon Cha, performed at Pace Schimmel Theatre in 1999. Since 2018, she has cultivated a corps of up-and-coming dancers through five seasons with the Queensboro Dance Festival, including an exploration of blues and flamenco in 2020's Hand Me Down My Walkin' Cane. She choreographed several numbers in the 2021 Danisarte production Lorca Siempre, and expanded and reworked them for Flamenco Latino's 2021 Mås Allá Series. Choreographed works performed at Flamenco Latino Dance Studio Theatre include La Rumba Cubana y Flamenca (2012), Flamenco Gumbo I (2015) and Flamenco Gumbo II (2016). In the 1980s, Aurora danced in Madrid's famous flamenco show Tablao El Corral de la Pacheca and toured the U.S. with the celebrated dance company Jose Molina Bailes Españoles. She has enjoyed a fruitful relationship with Angel Gil Orrios, director of Thalia Spanish Theatre, singing, choreographing and acting in all 3 of Mr. Gil's Picasso productions including Deseo Cogido por El Rabo, Las Cuatro Niñitas, and El FlamenConde de Orgaz. Additionally, she choreographed Angel's flamenco/tap musical Amor Latino, based on Romeo and Juliet and West Side Story. Aurora also choreographed original works for five seasons for Andrea Del Conte's Danza España /The American Spanish Dance Theatre, and flamenco tablao scenes & Entremedio sections for Knoxville Opera's 2005 production of Carmen. Her extensive teaching experience includes Flamenco and Salsa residencies with Young Audiences of NY and Community Works (1999-2013), and as an adjunct instructor in World Dance/Latin Styles at Stony Brook University from 1995-2002.

Basilio Georges is a flamenco guitarist, singer and composer, and co-founder and executive director of Flamenco Latino, who has shared both artistic and managerial responsibilities for the organization. Throughout his multi-faceted career, he has composed, arranged and performed music for theatre, dance and film, including performing the guitar intro to Pedro Almodovar's 1991 film High Heels. Of Greek Orthodox heritage on his father's side and Russian/Jewish heritage on his mother's, Basilio began studying flamenco in 1977 and during his early professional career worked in New York City as a jazz and salsa musician, touring with Jose Molina Bailes Españoles from 1983-85. He honed his accompaniment skills playing for classes in Madrid dance studios and for local singers at various flamenco peñas in Madrid and Sevilla during the 1980s. Most recently, he composed music for dancers and actors in Danisarte's Lorca Forever/ Lorca Siempre in 2021 and composed and recorded music for Aurora Reyes' choreography for the Queensboro Dance Festival from 2017-2021. Basilio wrote the music and arrangements for the 2009 Thalia Spanish Theater production Amor Latino and collaborated with director Angel Gil Orrios to mount the only staged versions of two of the three plays written by Pablo Picasso, Las Cuatro Niñitas andFlamenConde de Orgaz in 2003 and 2008. He has composed and arranged for the dance companies Carlota Santana Flamenco Vivo and Andrea Del Conte Danza España. His most recent CDs include "Retrospectiva Vol. 1: It's About Damn Time" and "Cante Flamenco in Nueva York" with Luis Vargas, and is working on "Acabo de Empezar," to be released in 2024. Basilio initiated Flamenco Latino's acquisition of a commercial dance studio in 2006 and has organized the development of year-round weekly adult & children's classes, performances on-site, outreach to school & community organizations, workshops with guest artists from Spain, and a studio rental business.

Omar Edwards is an African American tap dancer, entertainer, and musician who has been dancing since age of 12. Born in Brooklyn, New York, Omar draws his art from 23 years of experiences and formal training with masters like Henry LeTang, Jimmy Slyde, and Marie Brooks. In 1994, he earned national acclaim when he and partner Daniel B. Wooten Jr. won the grand prize on "Star Search." The same year he began an international tour of the hit show "Black and Blue" and later became a featured dancer in the Broadway show "Bring In Da Noise, Bring in Da Funk." During this time, he evolved a lyrical style of rhythm dancing and became a high-thinking philosopher of tap dance, resurrecting earth-stomping rhythms into their highest spiritual dimensions. Tap dance for Edwards is a spiritual journey. Omar Edwards later produced experimental works, which in the sheer audacity of their conception, distinguished him as a wildly imaginative and free jazz artist. At Minton's, the infamous be-bop after-hours jazz club in Harlem, Edwards would show up with his band, Seven Less, and a large black box. He designed a box that the audience could not see him enter or leave. The box covered him from his head to his knees. Only his feet were visible. In this way Edwards challenged audiences to focus attention on disembodied sounds. He continued making appearances with his black platform box at open microphone jazz clubs such as the Iridium, Smoke, Showman's, and Saint Nick's Pub. Omar Edwards' career spans the world of music, dance, television, theatre, and film. In 1998, he recorded "Tap Dancin is Music," being the first of his generation to release an album where the dancer is the leader of the band. TV appearances include starring as the "Sandman" on "Showtime at the Apollo" for seven years. He appeared on the Ellen Degeneres Show, and was featured in the musical movie "Camp." Concert credits include performing with Alicia Keys live at the Hollywood Bowl and with Savion Glover live at the White House. Omar has taken his concept, which he now calls "Afro Feet: Music and Beyond," on tour throughout Europe and Asia. The performance at JCAL will mark his third season of collaboration with Flamenco Latino.

Paige "Queen TuT" Stewart is from Queens, New York. Working as a dance teacher at various public schools, dance schools and arts centers as well as all over the Tri-state area instructing the youth in the movement &and dance. Her passions are a combination of spoken word poetry, physical poetry, and a love of performing. She maintains a well-rounded worth ethic and encompasses a dedication that can't be matched. Diagnosed with Lupus and Rheumatoid Arthritis at the age of twelve, she continues to move through the oncoming challenges as well as continues to inspire and evoke passion through everything she does.

Fascinated by the love of her favorite hip hop dance technique "Tutting," she has dedicated her training around popping dance styles. The Tutting style was originally practiced by young funk dancers and is derived from the positions people were drawn in the days of the Ancient Egyptians. It is these positions seen in these portraits that have been adopted by dancers today. So, when you "tut" you change the angles of your arms according to the beat. Those who are more experienced pop when changing from angle to angle thus refining the style. Tutting is still a greatly respected move and "King Tut" aka Mark Benson is widely acclaimed for pioneering the style. Not to be confused with King TuT as deep as the history is, Paige's style is way simpler. Paige explains, "Queen TuT signifies the divine right to master my craft. Any of us can be a King or Queen of our craft. What is yours?" The 2024 Más Allá Series will represent Paige's second year of collaboration with Flamenco Latino.

About Flamenco Latino

Since its inception in 1979, Flamenco Latino's professional company has explored and developed the genre known as Ida y Vuelta. This "Round Trip" genre was born during the late 18th century, when Spain and other countries in Europe were influenced by Latino dance and music, most notably the Cuban Habanera and Rumba, which led to flamenco tangos, tanguillo and rumba.

Flamenco Latino's recent Más Allá Series has pushed flamenco boundaries. Through the series, Flamenco Latino has encouraged the infusion of traditional Flamenco dance structures with jazz, blues and salsa, and welcomed the collaboration of such tap dancers as Omar Edwards. Since 2018, Flamenco Latino has presented its Series in collaboration with Jamaica Center for Arts and Learning.

For the past 30 years, Flamenco Latino's interpretation of Ida y Vuelta have included explorations of flamenco guajiras and many rumba styles, such as Peret, Bambino and The Gipsy Kings. The company's offerings over time have included many unusual amalgamations referencing mambo, cha-cha, danzon, bomba y plena, cumbia and merengue. Drawing on Basilio Georges' early professional career as a jazz musician, the music has reflected many jazz harmonic and improvisatory concepts.

Flamenco Latino's exciting and innovative repertoire has been presented at Pace University and New York's The Duke Theater, and through touring from 1997 to 2006. The company collaborated with Thalia Spanish Theatre from 2003-2009, in Amor Latino, a musical involving both tap and flamenco, and in a special interpretation of Picasso's art through plays written by the artist as directed by Angel Gil Orrios. From 2006-2016, Flamenco Latino ran a Studio Theater space in Midtown Manhattan, offering classes in dance, guitar, cante and palmas for adults and children, presenting performances and recitals, and producing workshops with artists from Spain.

Flamenco Latino currently offers both live and online classes and performances. Classes are held at studios in Jackson Heights, Queens, and in Greenwich Village, Manhattan.