A city open to diversity
The city of Barcelona has always been a scene of seismic vibrations in the flamenco field. It is a capital of contrasts, where plains and hills coexist, and has given rise to a free and heterodox flamenco. The flamenco of Carmen Amaya, La Singla and other artists has emerged from the lowest neighborhoods, imbued with a particular spirit that has characterized the city.
Flamenco has found a favorable place in Catalonia since the 19th century, being a capital with a population that enjoyed music, dance and other improvised arts in different venues in the city.
A defiant art during the Franco regime
During the Franco period, flamenco saw its presence reduced in purist circles, but some brave people continued to explore new forms in Barcelona. Venues like Los Tarantos hosted ephemeral experiments and high-voltage evenings, giving rise to a proto-modernity born of freedom and social and artistic miscellany.
The eighties saw a lack of interest on the part of cultural policies towards flamenco, but this art, like a living creature, was reborn with the new sounds of rumba and the revaluation of the urban scene.
A modern revival
At the beginning of the 21st century, the Flamenco Empíric festival represented an important support for the renewal of flamenco in the city. People like Juan Carlos Lérida fought to free this art from poses and clichés, making it evolve and experience new forms of expression.
Catalan flamenco managed to gain visibility and stopped constantly justifying itself. Under the influence of Lérida and other artists, this form of expression spread to other Catalan cities, consolidating itself as one of the most seductive artistic foci of the moment.
A creative evolution without borders
Flamenco in Barcelona has reached another level, entering new areas such as mechanical workshops, gymnasiums and cinemas. This evolution has invited the exploration of transversal themes and has given the new flamenco an unlimited creative and artistic category.
Without losing its roots, flamenco in Barcelona has become an avant-garde revolution full of future, with an evolution that still has a lot to offer.