Clap your hands say flamenco

Flamenco, the fiery art native to Spain that channels pain, love and exaltation through highly rhythmic guitar, wailing vocals and percussive dance, is flying into Las Vegas. This Sunday Spanish songstress Salvadora Galan will bring the art form she grew up with to the Winchester Cultural Center for an afternoon performance that will run the gamut from traditional ballads with lyrics by Federico García Lorca to modern incarnations of flamenco.

Galan now lives in El Paso, Texas, but the experienced singer and guitarist started her career as a young girl in the Southern Spanish town of Utrera just outside of Seville. Galan took a few minutes to talk to the Weekly about what it takes to perform flamenco and how she got started as a professional singer. Here, translated from Spanish to English, is what she had to say:

In your act you accompany yourself on the guitar. Is that unusual for a flamenco singer?

I’ve never heard of anybody that does that; for a female, at least, it’s very unusual. I started singing first of all, but then I came to the states and it was very hard for me to find a guitarist. So, I started playing and practicing, and practicing. It’s very hard because you have to be aware of two worlds, dos mundos. You need a lot of technique and concentration, because the flamenco singing part is very spiritual. You get carried away sometimes, but you have to pay attention to the guitar.

How did you learn to sing flamenco?

(I) grew up in an environment with flamenco. My father sang. … My brother … was a dancer. He made a movie with Carmen Amaya, Las Esperanzas, that was nominated for the Best Foreign Film. Today you hear CDs and you can learn from CDs, but we learned from our father and our family … traditional. To me this is very pure, you know?

What was it like being a professional at only 17?

Those were really hard times in Spain. In those days you had to work, but for me (flamenco) wasn’t work. I did it with all the love in the world, and they paid me on top of it. I had to make a living some way.

How does flamenco function as a part of people’s daily lives in Spain?

For us it’s the biggest thing. For me, it’s what moves my life. It’s a religion for me. And it depends who you ask. There are people in Spain who don’t like flamenco. Since my brother and I were born into it, we took it very seriously.

When you perform in the United States do people understand your music?

I get a good reception. They understand the feeling – they feel it – but it’s a shame that people who don’t speak Spanish can’t understand the words. It can be harder for people to appreciate the singing. They get the dancing more. Since I play the guitar and do solos, they pay attention.

Why do you think people outside of Spain are starting to listen to flamenco more now?

I think it’s very powerful and very spiritual. For me, it’s incomparable. I guess I would compare it a little bit to jazz, because it’s very spiritual. I see a lot of Americans who do it very well. Not the singing, but they dance flamenco very well and play the guitar, too. But the singing (has) something that’s very difficult that they can’t capture. It’s something personal.