You are a big help kimhe, thank you again! Any chance you can comment on the Madrid apts I posted under a separate thread? Just trying to firm up all my bookings.

Hi again! I believe either May 12th or 13th will work for a Flamenco performance in Barcelona. Any suggestions?

Nothing else than the high quality Tablao Cordobés or Tablao de Carmen on those spesific days.

A few days later, on Friday May 16th, the Palau de la Música Catalana hosts a homage performance to Carmen Amaya, going back in Barcelona flamenco history to the early 20th century. Great artists, among them, the grand-niese of Carmen Amaya, Karime Amaya: http://www.palaumusica.cat/en/carmen...d=False&cycle=

The annual Barcelona Ciutat flamenco festival goes on up in the Mercat de les Flors theater complex May 22-25. http://mercatflors.cat/en/ciclesifes...amenco-2014-3/

Might be a great concert at El Dorado on Thursday May 15th. Nothing scheduled yet, but Thursday is the night here, and usually top of the shelf artists give intimate concerts: http://eldorado-sfb.com/
Some of the recent concerts in El Dorado:
Belén Maya: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJVqifHGK04
La Tremendita: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6M_zBMI8os
Gema Caballero: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsIOH_FPVDY

Thanks! Unfortunately we leave for Madrid on the 15th. Do you think I should go ahead and book something now or wait until we get there?

I would book in advance.

The place we are staying at suggested Barcelona y Falmenco. It is at the the Teatre Poliorama on May 14th. Out of the 3 - above, Tablao Cordobés or Tablao de Carmen, which would you recommend?
Thanks!

Different concepts. Opera y flamenco at Teatro Poliorama is a full fledged staged theater performance, choreographed by a known flamenco dancer and with many talented artists. The mix with opera and the story-line might make it a bit too tailor-made and stereotypical for those seeking a genuine flamenco experience, but it has run for several years and been seen by hundreds of thousands: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StLdiNnxsgs

Tablao Cordobés and Tablao de Carmen are both very reputed flamenco restaurants (tablaos) where only top artists perform. You could pick any of them. Perhaps Tablao de Carmen, up at Montjuic and inside Poble Espanyol, could also be an extended experience. The tablao is in memory of the greatest flamenco dancer of all times, the barcelonesa Carmen Amaya (1913/17-1963) on the place she made her debut in 1929 during the world expo in front of the Spanish king: http://www.tablaodecarmen.com/histor...rcelona/en/94/

kimhe, I've noticed your considerable knowledge about flamenco in this and other postings. Tell me...are you an artist yourself? You amaze me speaking of so many performances and I have copied many of your youtube listings for future enjoyment. What a treat to be able to view these. But you live in Oslo? We're new in Boston with lots of culture and I've just discovered the Flamenco Dance Project at Regis College in Weston with a performance late this month. We enjoyed Andalucia last October.

I had never heard of duende before our October trip to Spain and Portugal...now have read Lorca, Jason Webster's travels, various comments. Please comment in the Fodors discussion on duende as to what you feel it is.

He-he, not a flamenco artist, no, but I'm sometimes good at feeling flamenco ;-)

Fodors discussion on duende?, where is that going on?

I think it's kind of dangerous to speak too loud and confident about duende, because it can easily be, and often is, so romanticized and trivialized. Today, when so much is about "strong emotions" in almost all kinds of culture and entertainment, where everybody all the time assure you (in tv programs etc) that they have got goose bumps of emotions (implicitly: "and so should you"), it can all fall very flat.

Duende is at least a rare thing, and nothing you could expect to experience in many flamenco settings or performances. When it's there, you just know it immediately. I think it has to do with those rare flamenco moments when things are so bare naked and true that everyone present forget themselves for a very strange and powerful moment.

You know Lorca, and he wrote that the duende in flamenco is a "power which everyone senses and no philosopher explains". It "brings to old planes unknown feelings of freshness, with the quality of something newly created, like a miracle, and it produces an almost religious enthusiasm".

The brilliant US flamenco critic Brook Zern says that the duende "dilates the mind's eye, so that the intensity becomes almost unendurable... There is a quality of first-timeness, of reality so heightened and exaggerated that it becomes unreal".

But I almost had a duende experience not long ago reading an essay by the brillant Norwegian author Karl Ove Knausgård. It was not about duende as such, but it can easily be the closest you can come to define duende in words.

in my poor translation:

"On the other hand there are zones in the human experience, where the boundaries in the social and biological-material sort of ceases to exist, it can happen in religion and it can happen in art, that the conciousness about your own self disappears, that the limits of time and space no longer matter, and you find yourself as if at one with the world, at one with the universe, as in religious ecstacy, or at one with the work, as in art.

The question is then if what you are experiencing, is not your own self, like it is when there are no conciousness or reflections about it, and that this self-less self, which perhaps only is a feeling of existence, is what the Swedish poet Gunnar Ekelöf called 'the for all equal'."
http://politiken.dk/debat/kroniken/E...for-alle-like/

Come on, kimhe, you really must say more about how you are so knowledgeable! But please do so as you check the topic Duende posted in Fodors Forum with any comments. Also check Flair for Flamenco. Just finished Webster's book "Duende, a journey into the heart of Flemenco"...have you read it? I wangt to discuss your comments about the almost duende experience reading a book. Sounds like you are not familiar with Fodors Forum where all kinds of topics are put forth.

Ozarksbill,

Hope you'll have a great experience if you go to the performance at Regis College. Boston seems to be serious and well informed about flamenco. Here's an interview in Boston Globe with plain fantastic Rocío Molina some months before she was awarded the National Dance Prize in Spain as the youngets flamenco dancer ever. Molina has performed several times in Boston, first time in 2002 when she was 18. http://www.boston.com/ae/theater_art...menco_her_own/

A little Rocío Molina potpurri:
2007, Almario (Soul closet): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUlWnXGUVLw
2008, Oro viejo (Old gold): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMKFmnswvQc
2009, Cuando las piedras vuelen/When stones fly: http://www.rociomolina.net/videos-cu...iedras-vuelen/
2010, Barcelona flamenco festival: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-jNDBUZ_So
2011, Vinatica: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvvgMjZ7AtE
2012, Afectos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97w_mvV7C9U
2013, Improvisation in tribute to the all time greatest female flamenco dancer Carmen Amaya (1913/17-1963) at the Carmen Amaya monument in Barcelona: http://vimeo.com/68734588
2014, Bosque Ardora (Heated forest): http://culturebox.francetvinfo.fr/sc...mporain-193185

WOW!
love love all your help with Spain!
which performance(s) would you suggest as we arrive Barcelona October 19-26:
we are first-time to Spain and will be in Granada, Seville, and Madrid as well later on this trip

We had hoped to attend flamenco, guitar performances throughout the trip, but had been told to wait till Seville!

can't wait for your reply so I can book asap

thank you so much!

In Barcelona I can recommend Tablao Cordobes and Tablao de Carmen, both only stage great artists: http://www.tablaocordobes.es/es
http://www.tablaodecarmen.com/

Not scheduled any theater or flamenco club (peñas) concerts for your dates yet, but it's updated here all the time: http://www.guiaflama.com/flamenco-en-barcelona/

More chance to see the unique theater or peña concert in Madrid, Granada and Sevilla than in Barcelona. Updated here:
http://www.guiaflama.com/flamenco-en-madrid/
http://www.guiaflama.com/flamenco-en-sevilla/
http://www.guiaflama.com/flamenco-en-granada/

I recommend these great tablaos in each city, performances every night, most artists are performing on the most important stages in Spain. All Places, included the two in Barcelona, include all the basic elements of flamenco: song (cante), guitar (toque) and Dance (baile).

Madrid:
Casa Patas: http://www.casapatas.com/
Corral de la Moreria: http://www.corraldelamoreria.com/
Cardamomo: http://cardamomo.es/

Sevilla:
Casa de la Memoria: http://www.casadelamemoria.es/
La Casa del Flamenco: http://www.lacasadelflamencosevilla.com/

Granada:
Casa del arte flamenco: http://www.casadelarteflamenco.com/
Peña la Plateria: http://www.laplateria.org.es/

muchas gracias!!! now I know where to book flamenco during our trip!

Bookmarking for flamenco shows during our trip next month.

Though we prefer jazz guitar, think Django, we plan on at least one flamenco show. We are staying on Calle Fabiola only a short block away from La Casa Del Flamenco in Seville. If we enjoy that show we will have a list on where to go as we move on to Granada, Cordoba and Madrid. I did find bars that may feature jazz in Seville, Cordoba and Madrid.

Thank you kimhe, many of your posts helped with our plans.

Cafe Central is the best jazz venue in Madrid. Only great both international and national artists, changing every week. Performances every night from about 9pm, and the best atmosphere long into the night. http://www.cafecentralmadrid.com/
Here's the program for first half of September: http://www.cafecentralmadrid.com/pro...ptiembre-2015/

You should also check out the Madrid Orquesta de Guitarras Django Reinhardt: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Orque...72219116232718

Thank you kimhe for the information, especially about Orquesta de Guitarras Django. I will bookmark their facebook page.

Café Central in Madrid I had already bookmarked; our apart-hotel is about 100 meters from it. We will be in Madrid 5-12 Oct. We will check their calendar and go at least once.

Do you have any knowledge about Naima Café Jazz, Calle Conde de Barajas, 2, Seville or Jazz Café, Calle Rodríguez Marín s/n, Cordoba? What I have learned makes them both interesting enough to stop by for a beer (in my wife's case Fanta Lemon). Jazz Café, like Café Central above, is about 100 meters from where we are staying.

Have ben to Naima in Sevilla a couple of times, small place, no live music when we were there, but fine atmosphere. Never been to Jazz Café in Cordoba, but it's right in the heart of "Roman Cordoba", my favourite part of town.

But I can assure you that Café Central in Madrid is a terrific place, have been to some great concerts here, and have often rounded off the Madrid night here long after concert time.

This might very well be from our first night here in late August 2009. Especially Javier Colina on double bass was huge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFgvSO26o1c