It was a gift from God: without expecting it or imagining it, it just happened. In 1992, the opportunity arose for me to start giving flamenco dance classes for boys and girls. .
That is how I discovered what would become my vocation: teaching how to dance flamenco.
Since then, I continue to rediscover my teaching vocation every day, as I love learning about psychology applied to dance and didactic methodology.
Currently, I greatly enjoy teaching face-to-face flamenco dance classes—which is how I began my career as a teacher in Málaga—as well as online flamenco dance classes with videos, which is how I personally learned 80% of what I know.
After practically a lifetime dedicated to learning and teaching flamenco dance and after many years of study, I have reached several conclusions:
My greatest challenge is to be coherent with myself and with what I preach as a dance teacher.
And I confess to you that, although I have my soundproof board to practice at home without making noise or disturbing the neighbors—something that used to make me sabotage myself to avoid practicing due to the laziness of having to leave the house and find a space to practice—I don’t always maintain what I call an “empowering practice routine,” and I continue to study why we procrastinate.
I understand everything much better in my life now. I needed to reach the age of 44 to understand who I am and, above all, to accept, approve of, respect, and give myself permission to live my life fully, with delight and pleasure.
Finally, I understand that I dance flamenco to connect with the earth and pray to God at the same time. Dancing flamenco is what truly releases my soul. Dancing flamenco is the main engine of my life, my greatest motivation
Finally, I understand why dancing flamenco motivates me so much: because it fills me with life. Simply put, I dance because it makes me happy. It is my way of meditating and flowing with life… “flamencamente”!
I realized that I have spent 44 years looking at myself in the mirror without seeing myself, without recognizing myself, without truly feeling myself. Now, however, I don’t even need the mirror when I practice, because I see myself without looking. I see myself reflected from within. And so, I could spend hours without even feeling time pass, because it seems that when I connect with my essence, when I dance for myself, time stops.
My dream, my vision, and my mission is to make flamenco dance as accessible and inclusive as possible, helping other people achieve their dream of learning to dance flamenco with online classes, breaking down geographical, economic, and language barriers, etc.
I have been very fortunate to have found in my path—from my dear Ana and Lucila Del Corral, who gave me the best foundation in Spanish Classical dance, to great masters of flamenco dance, such as my dear Susana Lupiáñez “La Lupi” or my dear Antonio Canales.
To all of them, even if I do not name them in these brief lines, I want to say THANK YOU FROM THE BOTTOM OF MY HEART.
I have been dancing since I was 8 years old and teaching flamenco dance classes for more than 28 years, the first 10 years very focused on children’s learning. Teaching is my vocation.
I graduated in communication and I am continuously studying flamenco dance, improving my didactic methodology, and researching psychology and how to manage our emotions so that my students achieve their own personal realization and develop their greatest talent.
And I confess to you that almost 80% of what I know about dancing, I owe to videos. I started recording flamenco dance videos from television on VHS tapes, which I played tirelessly until I could figure out by ear and by sight the footwork and the different markings that structured different flamenco dances.
Later, I had the great fortune of being able to receive masterclasses from great masters of flamenco dance, such as my dear Susana Lupiáñez, “La Lupi,” or Antonio Canales.
But as I always say, learning only begins in the academy. For what I call “flamenco magic” to occur—for there to truly be a transformation in you, in your body, in your way of expressing your dance—you must spend many hours of practice with yourself, in front of the mirror if you wish.
This is pure discipline, which I have also discovered over the years we do not need to experience as an obligation, but from love: love for yourself and love for flamenco dance.
That is why in 2011 I began the draft of my Online Flamenco Dance School project, although I could not resume it until 2015, with the dream of making flamenco dance as accessible and inclusive as possible.
In the year 2000, I passed several national castings and was selected as a “Freixenet bubble” to dance flamenco in that year’s Christmas commercial. I will never forget the greatest gift my discoverer, Leopoldo Pomés (who sadly left us in 2019), gave me. During the press conference presentation of the ad, he turned to me to announce it… I cried when I saw that he had given me a close-up dancing flamenco in the 2000 Freixenet commercial, in which I represented Andalusia.
Do you want to see the video of the ad? Click here.
When my students write to me to share their experiences with my video tutorials, to tell me what they are meaning in their lives, how much they are enjoying dancing, and how much my online flamenco dance classes are helping them.
Every day they write to me, they make my day and everything makes more sense to me. My students are my vision and my mission. They are the engine of everything I do as a flamenco dance teacher. It is what inspires me to keep improving myself… “flamencamente”!
So THANK YOU FROM THE BOTTOM OF MY HEART for being there, for letting me help you boost your self-esteem and transform your body and how you feel through flamenco dance.
. I thank God every day for this GIFT, for making me feel so alive every day, for making me feel 100% FLAMENCA.
