Tonight’s inaugural performance of “Viva Mexico” by Anita N. Martinez Ballet Folklorico (ANMBF) at the Winspear Opera House was an energetic fusion of elaborate footwork, intricate rhythms and vibrant colors coupled with missed light cues, questionable costume choices and lots of heavy blue eye shadow. Set to the time-honored trumpeting of mariachi music, the dancers of ANMBF moved with decisive and self-assured accuracy despite the myriad of technical issues they faced.
A majestic parade of dancers quietly made there way onto the stage decked in plumed gilded headdresses, golden loin-cloths and generously jeweled breast plates. As they entered, you could barely hear the gentle rattles of shell-like seeds or chalchahuites, worn around the dancers’ ankles. This dance titled, Concheros, included low squats, side kicks, and a masterful weaving of sixteen dancers in and out of geometric floor patterns, including lines, pinwheels, circles and squares, with choreography designed to exhibit the glorious skirts undulating like the body of a stingray as it glides through water.
The next piece, Sinaloa took me by surprise. Perhaps I’m projecting my western 2010 sensibilities onto this company, but I could have done without the bare stomach overflow, or as generation X has coined it, “muffin-tops,” bobbing up and down as the male dancers performed a series of intricate flamenco style heel stomps. Are big bellies not a relevant aesthetic concern for ANMBF? In general, costume designer, Altagarcia Valverde created a glorious assembly of brightly colored magnificent costumes for the entire evening, with this one exception – grown men in tight white pants and colorful button-down shirts tied in a bow just above their belly-buttons.
Revolucion was comprized of gun slinging men and women dressed in muted natural tones. A frenzy of familiar couples danced with each other in what appeared to be a similar movement vocabulary to other the dances we’d seen up to this point, only this time the mariach band was on stage with the them adding an element of live ritual. The piercing sounds of gunfire rang out as the dancers suddenly duck and turn thier rifles to the audience imitating a battle and scurrying off the stage in tandom until only one male dancer remains dead on the floor, clinging to his gun.
After Revolucion ended the stage went dark and two little shadows, kids age six and nine, quietly walked on. The call of Mariachi Los Reyes de Dallas rang out as the kids set a dance in motion, their little feet stomping and clicking with acute precision. Only, no one could see them. The stage remained dark until, out of the blue, the curtain dropped down and went back up again, this time to reveal a fully illuminated stage. The mini folkloricos breezed through their dance, once again, ending with a well deserved round of applause.
Sandwiched between each dance performance tonight were musical interludes by Mariachi Los Reyes de Dallas accompanying guest vocalists Roman Vargas Jr and Maura Lopez.
This concert will repeat May 7 & 8 8:00PM at the Latino Cultural Center 2600 Live Oak, Dallas, TX.
