Farruco Family: La Farruca & El Carpeta
Sunday, September 30, 7pm; Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco - TICKETS
The U.S. debut of the 14-year-old prodigy El Carpeta, and return of matriarch La Farruca—both of the legendary Los Farruco dynasty, the first family of Gypsy flamenco dance. As La Farruca is acclaimed for her elegance, her son El Carpeta is becoming known as the most extraordinary flamenco dancer of his generation and torchbearer for the family legacy. The youngest brother of Farruquito, he’s been teaching master classes since the age of six!
Only Carpeta’s astonishing dancing manages to upstage everything which has taken place during the course of the nearly two hours of the show.” -deflamenco.com
“And you feel in La Farruca …the accumulated wisdom of decades, the calm mastery that holds an audience in thrall and never lets it go.” –New York Times
Rosario Montoya Manzano “LA FARRUCA” is the daughter of legendary Farruco and the mother of El Carpeta, Farru and Farruquito. Born in 1962, she began dancing at a very young age. She has lived and breathed Gypsy flamenco from the time she was born and has performed all over Spain and toured the entire world appearing alongside her son Farruquito and her sister La Faraona. She first came to San Francisco in the 1980s with the touring Broadway production “Flamenco Puro” where she shared the stage with many of the great flamenco artists of the time such as her father El Farruco, La Fernanda de Utrera, El Guito and Manuela Carrasco. A recent New York Times review said of her: “You feel in La Farruca [...] the accumulated wisdom of decades, the calm mastery that holds an audience in thrall and never lets it go”.
Manuel Fernandez Montoya, “EL CARPETA” was born in Sevilla in 1997. It is said that out of all the family members, El Carpeta is the most similar in all ways to his late grandfather, the legendary flamenco dance master El Farruco. His entire life he has been witness to the purest form of the art of flamenco. He was given the artistic name Carpeta (file folder) because he remembered every dance step he witnessed live or on video after only seeing it once and never forgot it. He began teaching master classes when he was only 6 years old and presented his own show at the age of 12. Considered the most extraordinary dancer of his generation, this summer (2012) he will star in a major production directed by his older brother Farruquito who has recognized him as the torchbearer for the family legacy.
