BREA — With her fierce intensity and seamlessly expressive technique, La Tania evokes the power and mystique missing from so many programs in this era of debased flamenco stage shows.
In a Soleares on Thursday at the Curtis Theatre, La Tania made every movement an expression of anguish and individuality, evoking unspoken narratives of inner and outer states. Dancing as a guest, she dominated a program by Juan Talavera's flamenco troupe, which otherwise emphasized genial and extroverted theatrical values, with dollops of show-biz pizazz and easy-sell hip-swinging. Adios , pena Andaluz.
Pacing, even in the Canto Jondo selections, tended to be fast. The male and female corps were locked in symmetrical patterns. The whole was over-choreographed. In their "Viva Cadiz!" duet, for instance, the gaunt, intense Talavera and the willowy Gabriela Garza were shadowed and framed by four extraneous male dancers.
In other departures from elusive flamenco puro standards, Antonia Lopez used a black sombrero to cover extravagant rolling hip-moves in "Tanguillos de Cadiz." Angelina Valenzuela discarded the appealing vulnerability in an early Alegrias for audience-courting in the Fiesta por Tangos.
