Sweaty Hard Work
I wrote this back in the fall of 2013 when I was in Barcelona studying with David Romero. I thought you might enjoy reading it and finding out more about him...
November 22, 2013
I told you I'd be visiting Barcelona to study with David Romero.
I told you I'd been wanting to take classes from him for years.
And here I am in Barcelona
Finalment!
(Catalán. We are in Barcelona after all.)
Studying with David.
Stefani is here too. She's been with me since the Flamenco Tour. You know I no longer believe in traveling to Spain to study all by myself. (At least for the time being.)
But back to David
I love him. I figured I would, but you never know. He's friends with Ricardo, but that hasn't always worked in my favor.
And I love our classes.
Outside of class David is pretty tranquilo.
But in class, a trabajar, to work!
We laugh and have fun.
But, oh my goodness, we work hard.
Sweaty hard.
Which may seem obvious considering we're dancing. But I don't sweat a lot. And I've been sweating much more than usual for me.
Ricardo has always told me I need to sweat more. He sometimes gets mad at me. Not regular mad. Ricardo mad which is different. He says I'm not working hard enough when I don't sweat. He says I need to dance it and dance it and dance it and dance it. And then I will sweat. He says I stop and think too much ... Tiene razón.
So, yeah, I'm sweating in class with David
The first two days were tough. Emotionally, that is. I felt stupid and like I should just quit considering I was a horrible dancer, and there was obviously no point. Even though I loved what he was teaching us.
But by the third day, something shifted.
And I started to feel inspirada...
To keep working.
To keep dancing.
To keep trying.
Tonight many body parts are hurting
But I feel like dancing Tangos de Málaga, that's what we're working on with David.
After class this evening I took a shower and went for a walk around Barcelona, and as I walked I just kept wishing I could go dance some more.
I've decided I'm going to try not to flip out if the feeling goes away. I should know by now that it comes and goes and that's fine.
It's okay if I don't feel inspirada every single day.
But today, in Barcelona, I do
And that feels good.
...
Okay, so let me tell you a little more about the situation in Barcelona with David. As I mentioned he's someone I had been admiring from afar for years and desiring to study with. After the absolutely crazy fun time I had doing the Flamenco Tours to Jerez I began dreaming of a tour to Barcelona with David.
But I had to check him out in person first...
So Stefani and I went to Barcelona and took semi-privates, kind of our own personal workshop, with him. We asked that he teach us some Tangos de Málaga because we absolutely loved what was happening in this video. Honestly, I'm quite certain I would have been happy with whatever he gave us.
In class he would sing for us while we danced. And he was pretty good. At first I was surprised, but then, once I heard his story, it made a lot of sense.
You see, David has been dancing since he was three years old. He grew up going to peñas and hearing flamenco all of the time. He's from Barcelona, but his family is from Andalucía. His brother is a guitarist, his mom sings (for fun). He began working professionally when he was fourteen.
He had all kinds of stories which he would often share with us over a pre-class café. (He often liked to meet to tomar algo before class.)
I was intrigued by all of these stories, so I asked to interview him. Stay tuned, that interview will be out soon.
By the way,
You can read (in Spanish with English translations) some of the letras David would sing in class using the links below:
Comments
What about you. Are you feeling inspired lately? When you're not, what do you do? Do you accept it? Do you feel badly? Do you search for it? Please do share in the comments below.
Would you too like a private workshop in Barcelona with David?
Well, then you're in luck! Because I have one planned for this November. You can get all of the details here.
...
This is a reworking of this.