Six years after its last premiere, the company Lizt Alfonso Dance Cuba (LADC) will present its new show, “Habana Fénix” at the Martí Theater starting on May 5 and throughout the month.
“This is a tribute to Havana and especially to the historian Eusebio Leal, on whom intense work has been done since 2019,” declared the company’s founder and director at a press conference from the Iberostar Parque Central Hotel, located in the historic center. habanero.
“We are reborn from the ashes every day and we do not let ourselves be defeated. That is the most important message, ”said the choreographer, who listed some of the obstacles that her group has faced since her last performance, such as the COVID-19 pandemic.
?The Lizt Alfonso Dance Cuba company shares the details of its next presentation in a press conference. ?Habana Fénix ?World premiere that from May 5 and throughout this month, will be on the billboard at the Martí Theater.#CubaIsCulture pic.twitter.com/Fj2dlFKyUW
— National Council of Performing Arts Cuba (@ArtEscenicasCub) April 25, 2023
“The work of the restorers of Old Havana is the guiding thread and from there the essence and presence of the culture of Spain and Africa enters to the present day,” said the also dancer, quoted by the agency EFE. The show has choreographies by dancers and teachers trained by LADC, such as Yadira Hernández, Diana Fernández, Claudia Valdivia, Laura Abreu, Daira Jay and Yohara García.
As in all LADC shows, music plays a leading role. For this occasion, the creators of the ambitious performance chose a selection of composers ranging from Amadeo Roldán and Sindo Garay to Lucía Huergo and Roberto Valera. The company’s musical group, directed by Carmen Souto, will also participate live during the next three weeks of presentations.
The play, which will be on the billboard until May 21 at the Marti Theateris “full of nuances and turning points” and is “different from what the public has seen of the company,” said Alfonso.
“We are doing something that is projected internationally from the national level,” said the teacher, who was also on the list. BBC 100 Women of 2018, which brought together the hundred most influential and inspiring women of that year.
“In the crisis is where you have to grow and find a way to grow all together,” Alfonso mentioned at the press conference. Hence, “Havana Fénix” shows, according to his words, “the resilience of the man who lives making his way from the cell to infinity, from the time he gets up to the time he goes to bed, day by day.”
“Habana Fénix” has the support of various institutions, companies, private enterprises and sponsors such as the Office of the Historian of the City of Havana, the Ministry of Culture, Suchel Camacho SA, the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation, Manu Clothing and Toca Madera, among others.
Currently, the presentation of this show is being coordinated on international stages.
Created in 1991 by Lizt Alfonso, the institution is one of the most recognized school-companies in Cuba and the world, with a professional career that includes performances at the City Center (New York), the New Victory Theater (Broadway), the Shanghai Oriental Art Center (China) and other large squares.
The company has an impressive artistic level, multiple recognitions and great popularity inside and outside national borders. In addition, it maintains vocation workshops and children’s and youth ballets as a strategy to guarantee its future.
In her repertoire she includes works that fuse contemporary ballet, flamenco, popular Cuban and Afro-Cuban dances, among other genres.
Lizt Alfonso (1967) has been presented in a hundred theaters in various parts of the world. She founded her own company in 1991 and in 2011 she was named a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador. In 2016, she received the International Honor Award in the United States from the (former) First Lady Michelle Obama for her remarkable educational and social work.
In February of last year he inaugurated MaleconART 255an initiative focused on art instruction and entertainment that hosts ballet workshops, shows, flamenco and popular dances.
EFE/Oncuba/Jaime Masó Torres
