Compañía Kaari Martin

Compañía Kaari Martin BIO

Compañía Kaari Martin on suomalainen nykyflamencotanssiryhmä ja ainoa pääpalkinnoilla palkittu ulkomaalainen ryhmä flamencon tärkeimmässä koreografiakilpailussa Certamen de Coreografía de Danza Española y Flamencossa.

Ryhmä kuuluu tuotteliaimpiin ja kokeellisimpiin Pohjoismaissa. Ryhmän teosta La Kalevala kutsuttiin lehdistössä flamencon läpimurroksi Suomessa. Kesäkuussa 2006 ryhmän teos ”Kerro minulle sade” palkittiin Madridin koreografiakilpailussa kolmannella palkinnolla, se oli ensimmäinen kilpailun viisitoistavuotisen historian aikana palkittu ulkomaalainen teos.[1] Vuonna 2007 ”Kerro minulle sade” kutsuttiin Madridiin ”La otra mirada del flamenco” -sarjaan, jossa se sai erityisesti huomiota osakseen ensimmäisenä kansainvälisenä esityksenä sarjan 12-vuotisessa historiassa, jossa on aiemmin nähty useita Espanjan nimekkäimpiä esiintyjiä. Vuonna 2009 ryhmä toteutti flamencoteoksen Peppi Pitkätossu Helsingin Juhlaviikoille Kansallisoopperaan.

Helmikuussa 2010 Roni Martinille myönnettiin vuoden teatterimusiikkiteko-palkinto teoksesta Peppi Pitkätossu.[2]

Joulukuussa 2012 Compañía Kaari Martinin Korppi ja kello -teos voitti kolme pääpalkintoa maailman tärkeimmässä koreografiakilpailussa flamencossa. Kaari Martin voitti pääpalkinnon parhaasta soolokoreografiasta, Roni Martin parhaasta musiikista ja Erika Turunen parhaasta puvustuksesta. Koskaan aiemmin ei ole ulkomainen ryhmä vienyt kilpailun ykköspalkintoa.

Fuente: http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compa%C3%B1%C3%ADa_Kaari_Martin

About the company

"I think it´s great that the flamenco we do here in Finland is made from our own point of view. There is no point hanging around in polka dotted dresses and to be a-wanna-be-spanish"

-Kaari Martin-

Compañía Kaari Martin is an independent dance group founded in 2002. Its unique style has been described as ”contemporary flamenco”. The group’s founder and artistic director is dancer-choreographer Kaari Martin together with composer-musician Roni Martin.

The primary aim of the group is to incorporate contemporary flamenco and its Nordic dimension into the field of international contemporary art and make it internationally well-known among very different audiences.

Distinctive for the company is intensive relation between music and movement. The group is also truly international: so far almost 30 dancers from four countries and musicians from seven countries have collaborated with the group, among them two of the world´s most prestigious flamenco singers Miguel Poveda and Rafael Jimenez ”Falo”. The group’s performances are often accompanied by live orchestra.

Fuente: http://www.companiakaarimartin.fi/en/page_about_the_company.html

Press release, December 9, 2012: Three top honours for Finland in the world’s most prestigious flamenco competition

Compañía Kaari Martin takes prizes for best solo choreography, best music and best costumes

Three top honours for Finland in the world’s most prestigious flamenco competition

The Compañía Kaari Martin hit the jackpot in the world’s most prestigious flamenco choreography competition, the Certamen de Coreografia de Flamenco y Danza Española. The company’s The Raven took home the first prizes in all three solo choreography categories: Kaari Martin for best choreography, Roni Martin for best music for a dance work, and Erika Turunen for best costume design. The prize for best group choreography went to Eduardo Martínez and Cristian Pérez and Cristina Aguilera shared the prize for best dancer. The competition was held at the Teatro Matadero in Madrid on December 6–9, 2012.

“It’s quite exceptional for a foreign group to win a prize at the Certamen competition,” say Kaari and Roni Martin. “For us, the stack of prizes means major recognition for our sustained development of a style all of our own drawing widely on influences right across the genre. It means a lot to us that we won the prizes for an original work that does not in any way try to be Spanish but that adds a distinctly Nordic perspective on the genre and freely combines various genres of the art.”

“Gaining recognition in a competition that has served as a springboard for many top flamenco artists leaves us quite speechless,” adds Kaari Martin. “The jury, which was chaired by Antonio Najarro, director of Spain’s National Ballet, and included among its members Rosalía Gómez, director of the Seville Biennale, was unanimous in its decision. I have to say we were surprised the jury were so bold. It was a clear statement of the need for some new approaches to flamenco.”

“Being awarded a prize for flamenco in Spain, the very source of the genre, makes it feel finest of all,” Roni Martin continues. “For me, a Finnish music maker, it’s a great honour to join the ranks of composers awarded prizes in the competition. The fact that we won prizes for both choreography and music also feels good because we’ve been working together so closely for ten years now that we can’t really say where one domain ends and the other begins.”

Prizes have been awarded to foreign groups only sparingly in the competition’s 20-year history. This was the second time the Compañía Kaari Martin had taken part. On the previous occasion, in 2006, it took the third prize for choreography with a work entitled Tell Me Rain – the first honour ever to go to a foreign group in the competition.

Versatile contemporary art

The work, The Raven, entered by the company for the competition is a tribute to the flamenco avant-gardists of the 1930s. With a choreography by Kaari Martin, it is based on music and lyrics by Roni Martin.

“It is important for us to do all-round works in which dance, music and the visual aspect are strongly interwoven,” says Kaari. “Our choreographies combine a wealth of modern dance influences with flamenco. The result is a kinetic language all of our own, and the music composed by Roni for our works is contemporary music that nevertheless respects the flamenco idiom. For us, flamenco is a means of self-expression and of creating fresh contemporary art.”

The Raven was performed in Madrid by Spanish dancer Mariana Collado. She has been collaborating closely with the Compañía Kaari Martin since 2009, performing in, among others, its Pippi Longstockings for children. She has also guested with Lady’s Circus at the Flamingo Festival held by the Compañía Kaari Martin.

The Compañía Kaari Martin is an independent dance group formed in 2002 whose works have broadened the concept of flamenco as a form of international contemporary art. One of the finest groups on the contemporary flamenco scene, it has a repertoire that combines flamenco technique with the freedom of modern dance. The company has also gained recognition abroad: at the 2006 choreography competition in Madrid Tell Me Rain was the first foreign work in the competition’s 15-year history to be awarded a prize. The Raven now claimed a triple victory, taking the main prizes for best solo choreography, best music and best costumes.

Choreographer-dancer Kaari Martin is one of the top names in contemporary flamenco. Her company’s own repertoire naturally combines flamenco technique with the freedom of modern dance, and its works have indeed broadened the concept of flamenco as a form of international contemporary art. An international artist, Kaari Martin has been performing solo and in groups in a number of countries since 1994. Recent works by her have included Pippi Longstockings, a family work created for the 2009 Helsinki Festival, On a String, in collaboration with Minna Tervamäki, and The Raven, a solo work based on a poem by Roni Martin. www.companiakaarimartin.fi

Roni Martin is a Finnish musician, composer, lyricist and producer. In the course of his career he has composed music for, among other things, dance works, films and multimedia productions, and worked as a producer. He also conducts his own Roni Martin & Band performing compositions based both on his own lyrics and on those of other Finnish poets, such as Eino Leino and Pentti Saarikoski. In addition to a solo disc released in early 2010, his recent compositions include the large-scale production Pippi Longstockings for the Compañía Kaari Martin that won him the Theatre Music Act of the Year prize. www.ronimartin.fi

Erika Turunen has been designing the costumes for opera, theatre and dance productions since the beginning of the 1990s. She was head of the costume department at the Finnish National Opera 1995–2009 and has won special acclaim abroad for her costumes for modern dance. Finnish Jorma Uotinen, Susanna Leinonen, Kenneth Kvarnström and Jouka Valkama and Norwegian Jø Strömgren are among her partners. She has been collaborating with the Tero Saarinen Company since the beginning of the 2000s, designing the costumes for over ten works by Saarinen. In spring 2007 she was in charge of costumes for the European Song Contest. In 2011 she designed the costumes for such productions as the musical Cabaret at the Lahti City Theatre and Juha and Blood Wedding at the Finnish National Opera. The Ateljee Hurma established by her in 2010 designs not only for various productions but, to order, also stage costumes and evening dresses. Erika Turunen began her partnership with the Compañía Kaari Martin with Pippi Longstockings in 2009 and since then has designed all the company’s costumes.