The Flamenco tablao returns to Red Light Café! In the spirit of back rooms and taverns of southern Spain, this showcase of Flamenco is raw, unrehearsed, and fully improvised to create an electricity that audiences say sends chills through the air and brings tears to the eyes. It's a night of live guitar, singing, and percussive dance featuring the elite Flamenco artists of Atlanta and the U.S.A.
Berdolé is pleased to welcome dancer Lakshmi Basile and guitarist / singer Cristian Puig to Atlanta in January with Julie Moon (palmas) for a performance presented by Red Light Café.
$12 Adv – $15 Door
Doors @ 6:30 PM
All ticket sales are final. No refunds.
Lakshmi Basile began performing at age six with her parents’ band ‘The Electrocarpathians’. She studied dance through primary, middle, and secondary school at the San Diego School of Creative and Performing Arts. She grew up within San Diego’s flamenco scene, where her passionate artistic persona began to form.
After performing regularly as a flamenco dancer in California and studying classical dance at the University of California at Santa Barbara, Lakshmi moved to Spain at age 20 to further her flamenco studies. She was fortunate to quickly be embraced by artists there and has come to work aside great artists such as Manuel Molina, Remedios Amaya, Antonio Moya, Carmen Ledesma, Antonio Rey… She was given the nickname La Chimi (which is simply her own name re-pronounced).
In recent years, Lakshmi Basile ‘La Chimi’ made history, being the first non-Spanish artist to win an award in the central Flamenco contest, Concurso de las Minas de La Unión, in 2011. She also was granted an award in another primary contest, the Concurso Nacional de Arte Flamenco de Córdoba. There she surprised Flamenco critics and received stunning reviews; “-un desgarrador homenaje a los románticos de lo jondo…” (a heartwrenching homage to the romantics of pure flamenco) Alberto García Reyes, ABC.
Within ten years, Lakshmi has solidly founded her career in Sevilla, the cradle of flamenco. She performs daily as the main protagonist at El Palacio Andaluz in Sevilla and appears with major flamenco artists at private parties and festivals throughout the year. She has also performed in Germany, Italy, Lebanon, Morocco, Portugal, Great Britain and Denmark, and produced her own theatrical show in Spain, entitled “Zarabanda, Lo Que Duerme en el Cuerpo de los Gitanos.” She is much sought after as a teacher by Flamenco students in Spain and gives workshops during her travels.
Lakshmi Basile has founded a substantial artistic career as a Flamenco dancer, because that is what she is at heart. “Su baile es de una alegria conquistada (her dance is a conquered happiness)”- Felix Grande, poeta and flamencoligist. “La unica cosa Americana que tiene es su pasaporte (the only American thing about her is her passport)”- Angel Ojeda, former minister of La Junta de Andalucía.
Cristian Puig works nationwide as a Flamenco guitarist and is known to Atlanta audiences for his tablao and theater performances, as well as his role of "Joaquin" in the Alliance Theatre's production of “Zorro”. Besides live performance, he has worked in films, such as A Late Quartet, for which he composed flamenco music for the soundtrack. Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Cristian Puig is the son of Flamenco singer Gloria Monreal and Flamenco guitarist Pablo Puig. As a teenager, Cristian began his studies in classical guitar at the conservatory of Manuel de Falla as well as Flamenco guitar with his father. Soon he took classes in Flamenco guitar with Quique de Cordoba and furthered his studies in jazz, bossa nova and contemporary music. In 1990 he formed and toured South America with his group Rabat, fusing jazz, bossa nova and Flamenco. Cristian released the CD “Entre Cuerdas” featuring Flamenco-jazz fusion and has just released a new CD entitled Inflam project, which crosses Indian and Flamenco styles.
Julie "Moon" Galle Baggenstoss has performed and choreographed Flamenco dance for the Atlanta Opera, Georgia State University’s School of Music, The Latin American Association, Coves Darden P.R.E., and at universities and museums from the Southeast to the Midwest. She is a member of the faculty of Emory University’s Dance Program, where she teaches Flamenco as part of the university curriculum. Julie is a former instructor of the Atlanta Ballet, and teaches for organizations such as the American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese, the Foreign Language Association of Georgia, and Georgia Public Libraries. She currently tours her original shows for kids “Ferdinand por farruca” and “That’s Apoyo”, and performs in “Olé flamenco”, presented by Young Audiences Woodruff Arts Center.
Julie’s dance style reflects continuing education and years of classes with Spanish dance teachers, including Angelita Vargas, Juan del Gastor, Manuela Reyes, Pilar Ortega, Manuel Liñán, and Juan Paredes. Her work is guided by the far-reaching input of Flamenco artists La Meira and Antonio Granjero. Off stage, Julie produces Flamenco performances and educational seminars involving Spanish Flamenco artists in residence in the United States of America. She lectures on the history, evolution, and cultural significance of Flamenco and its artists. Julie is the co-founder of jaleolé, a grass-roots marketing organization that shaped Atlanta’s Flamenco landscape for a decade. Growing awareness about Flamenco – its origin and evolution, its many and varied interpretations, and the art form’s place in American culture – is part of the work taking place in Julie’s projects, including Berdolé, flamencoclasses.com, Flamenco Georgia, and others.