While my obsession with flamenco began twenty years ago, I still regularly find myself flipping out, amazed, jaw dropped and thinking how flamenco is so *%&#@ing cool. (Raise your hand if you know what I mean.) It can happen when I'm listening to a song, even one I've heard a million times, when I'm in class, at a live performance, watching a video, at a juerga. Because this art form is incredible, the singing, the dancing, the guitar playing, the rhythm ...

I felt that way after seeing the video of Amador Rojas below.

Here's one of the letras he dances to:

Soleá Apolá*

Ni Veracruz es cruz
ni Santo Domingo es santo
ni Puerto Rico es tan rico
pa que lo veneren tanto

Veracruz is no cross
nor is Santo Domingo a saint
nor is Puerto Rico so rich
to be so highly revered

You can hear today's letra at 50 seconds into the video below; you MUST check out Amador's jump at 1:37. (This is merely one part of his dance; scroll down for video links to the rest of this caña.)

I’ve had the good fortune of seeing Amador live both on stage and in the tablao. There is nothing like it nor anybody like him...

*According to this book, El mar de los deseos: el Caribe hispano musical : historia y contrapuntal, this verse comes from the following song originally recorded by the Jesuit Ajofrín in 1763 when he was in Veracruz, Mexico:

Tres cosas hay en el mundo
que causan dolor y espanto:
ni la Veracruz es cruz,
ni Santo Domingo es santo,
ni Puerto Rico es tan rico,
pa' que lo veneren tanto...

There are three things in this world
that cause pain and fear:
that Veracruz is no cross,
nor is Santo Domingo a saint,
nor is Puerto Rico so rich,
to be so highly revered...

If you'd like to hear more, listen to Rafael Romero sing today's letra here.