Grace - elegance - age - distinction … words often used in describing the character and qualities of a well-nurtured mature wine when it reaches the palate.
Andalucía, in Southern Spain, has for time immemorial produced fine wines of unique characteristics in a system that stacks oak barrels containing the precious juice in several layers, with the containers at the top receiving young wine from the latest harvest. Then, over many years, during which it ages and gains maturity, the same wine is poured down the inverted quality ladder into barrels below, eventually ending in the bottom layer of barrels, on a structure called ‘solera’ that rests on the ground, the ‘suelo’.
In essence, a young juice must inherently possess the good qualities that, if properly cared for in that way through the passage of time, will transform into the delicious final product of the solera.
Age is undoubtedly the most essential element in the process and, just as traditional societies all over the world have revered and respected their elders, in full recognition that the passage of time equates with the acquisition of wisdom, the people of Andalucía still do just that, and go even further. They use the familiar word, ‘solera’, in trying to express the subtlety of certain indescribable qualities, such as you may find in a building, a village, a tradition over the ages, or even the pose of a person; the grace and elegance of his or her movements, or simply the expression on their face.
The present work, SOLERA aims at presenting on the stage the raw talent ofyoung artists tempered by the elegant, understated authority of an older, wisergeneration who expect - and demand (!) better expression from the youngsters ifever they hope to reach the level of the bottom barrel… the one closest to thecentre of the earth.
Flamenco is not a written tradition but one handed down from one generation tothe next, constantly striving to find different ways to express; the best of performances will incorporate part of what has been created before by the greatpractitioners of the past. If young talented artists are bursting to show off theirenergy and distinct creative abilities, the mature solera brought to them by oldergenerations will enrich and refine their qualities, undoubtedly helping them on theway to becoming worthy exponents of the art.
