Museo del Grito (FringeTIX)
Velada @ Higher Ground (Main Theatre)
6:00pm, Thu 22 Mar 2007
At last – a really good show in Higher Ground.
Attracted by a beautifully obscure and enticing blurb in the Guide, I wander into Higher Ground to see women lying on the ground, a bloke playing keys at the back of the stage, accompanied by another chap just sitting on a chair looking pensive. For the entire performance. Seriously, I didn’t see him actually do anything, though I’ll concede that I was very often distracted. Odd.
But then the performance starts, and a narrator – introducing himself as The Scientist – takes to the stage and, with very deliberate movements and even more measure speech, guides us through the Mystery of Women – four acts, each a gorgeous vignette accompanied by stunning dance, each centred on one of the four female flamenco dancers. The (fabulous) oration and backing music lends a dark and mysterious mood to proceedings, and the dancing… oooooooooh.
The first act is stunning, dancers performing their own percussion with 7-foot pole stomping; Yasmine Nicholls’ Mermaid in the second act was breathtakingly beautiful, and the fourth act was simply gobsmacking – ascending to a massively FIERY finale that felt like I was being emotionally battered by the forceful wills of the four dancers.
Oh yes, this was an absolute blinder. One of the shows of the Fringe, methinks – and a gorgeous programme, too.
Hey there, thanks for the review. We had a lot of fun doing the show and glad you liked it. Just FYI, I was the “chap just sitting on a chair looking pensive”. You did say you were distracted so I’ll forgive you for not noticing that I was actually the percussionist :) The ‘chair’ I was sitting on is called a cajon and is a percussion instrument often used in flamenco. Glad you liked the programme too – I designed it :)
All the girls in the show are stunning, aren’t they? Anyway, thanks again for the positive review and hope to see you at a future show.
Adrian