At our flamenco school, you will be learning technique and choreography simultaneously with live or recorded music so that you walk away from a course with a dance that you can perform. We recommend a two-week minimum to learn a complete choreography.

Flamenco culture integrates dance, language, and cultural tradition. Perfection in dance requires an appreciation of the music and an understanding the language used in songs. For this reason, we offer dance, music, and language classes.

Our flamenco instructors are both teachers and performers. They teach during the day and perform on our stage at night. 

Kika is one of the most notable flamenco dancer in Granada. In 2023 Kika was awarded the Medal of Andalusia from her hometown for her contribution to culture. A native of Granada, Kika began studying dance since she was five years old and has been performing at the stage since she was ten. She took her first dance steps at the Marichú dance school and continued at the Mariquilla’s school where she seriously trained as a flamenco dancer. At eleven years old, she represented Granada at the International Festival of Youth and Students in Moscow. Since then, she trained with famous dancers, such as Joaquín Grilo, Farruquito, Eva Yerbabuena, Antonio Canales, Joaquín Cortés, Patricia Guerrero, Estela Arauso, Javier Barón, and Rafaela Carrasco, but spent the longest intensive training time with Maestro Mario Maya for nine months by the means of one of the eleven flamenco scholarships awarded at the national level. She also performed in the most prestigious national flamenco festivals, sharing the stage with figures of the stature of José Mercè, Pansequito, Fosforito, Aurora Vargas, and in special national level performances attended by their Majesties the Kings of Spain, US presidents, and other dignitaries.

Kika worked as a teacher for twenty years at the Mariquilla flamenco school and at the Carmen de las Cuevas school. She has also directed the Cenes de la Vega municipal dance school and the Pinos Genil municipal dance school. Kika also taught flamenco outside of Spain, such as in Lisbon, Shanghai, Beijing, Reunion Island, Rio de Janeiro, San Pedro de Sula, Dubai, and other cities. In 2017 Kika created her own company Flamenco Passión, with which he has already had three shows, “A Tiempo”, “De Lucía a Camarón”, and “Al-Andalus Legacy”, with whom she toured Brazil, the United Arab Emirates, Portugal, and South America, thanks to the production of Totalísimo. With Ballet Flamenco Granada and other companies, Kika performed on stages all over the globe.

Francisco Fernández Pérez, known as Paco de Andrea, was born in Deifontes, Granada. Paco is one of the best male flamenco stars in Granada. He studied flamenco in the footsteps of Antonio Canales, Los Farrucos, and Manolete among others and subsequently danced in the famous tablaos of Granada. On the international scene, Paco performed with the company of Juan Andrés Maya as well as independently in Russia, USA, Japan, Germany, Siberia. Among his memorable shows were:
•Paris, Tour Andalusia, 2016.
•Mongolia, Festival músicas del mundo, Ullaw Ude, 2018.
•Miami, Tablao el Cava, Tablao Madrid, 2019.
•USA, University of Massachusetts, 2016-2018.
•Islandia, Teatro Reykjavik, 2019.

Estefanía is a native of Granada. She began her dance education at Asociación de Profesores de Danza Española in 2003 in Albolote, where in 2009 she obtained a degree in Classic Spanish Dance. She continued with flamenco dance education at the Reina Sofia Dance Conservatory, where she obtained a professional degree in 2014. Since then, Estefanía studied flamenco with Manuel Liñán, La Lupi, Fuensanta La Moneta, Daniel Doña, and Ray Benitez.

Estefanía dances regularly in the famous tablaos of Granada and is a member of many dance companies, such as Ballet Flamenco Granada, Flamenco Passion, Vinculados, Spanish Dance Ballet, with whom she toured many parts of the world, including China, Latin America, and the Middle East.

Mark Tomass is the founder and director of Academia Flamenco, Español y Danza Oriental. Mark teaches Sevillanas and Rumbas. He studied dance at the Boston Ballet School, but later developed a passion for flamenco and studied with Mari Carmen Guerrero in Granada, Natalia Merino and Manuel Pantoja at Amor de Dios in Madrid, with Juan Parra of Jerez de la Frontera and with Lidia Valle Lopez in Sevilla. Mark taught Flamenco Dance as an Art requirement at the University of New York in Prague and taught Flamenco Dance as a physical education requirement at Masaryk University in Brno. Mark performed flamenco as a character dance at the National Theatre in Prague (2005 – 06) and performed at dance balls. 

José Cortes Fernández (El Pirata)

Academia Flamenco is proud to present El Pirata, one of the top professional guitarists of flamenco in Granada, to teach Harmony, Scales, Rhythm, and Improvisation as well as fusion of Flamenco with other music such as Jazz, Blues, and Bossa Nova.

El Pirata is a Musician, Composer, Guitarist, Music Arranger, Music Producer, Guitar Teacher, and Singer. He is a self-taught guitarist, who was noticed for his talent since he was 12 years old. Soon after he participate with music groups, such as “Los Farruquitos”, “Los Chanelos”, “Amangue” and “Color Flamenco”. With the last group, he thrived as a guitarist, composer, arranger, and vocalist. In the year 2000, he was nominated for best flamenco-fusion album in Andalusia. Later, at the age of 20, he began working in Tablaos and the Cuevas of Sacromonte, where he forged himself as a soloist and dance guitarist. He also began touring Peñas and stages in flamenco festivals and ethnic and world music such as: Esparrago Rock, Parapanda Festival, Festival Flamenco Albaicín, Ogijares, and others. After that El Pirata performed at many music festivals around the world with famous singers, such as Antonio Gomez “El Colorao”, and Chonchi Heredia, Tati Román, José “El Francés”, and dancers, such as Jose El Indio, and La Moneta. He also performed with the New York trumpeter and percussionist Jerry Gonzalez.

Selected Discography: 2001 “Jóvenes con Esencia Flamenca”. 2008 “Entre Amigos” with the pianist Sergio Pamies. 2009 “Borrachito” with the pianist Sergio Pamies. 2010 with Magui y los Sirénidos. 2011 with the singer Álvaro Rodríguez. 2012 “Glamurosa” with singer Chonchi Heredia.

The distinct flamenco rhythem patterns

Flamenco guitarists are known as tocaores. The term is derived from an Andalusian pronunciation of tocadores, meaning players.  The technique of the flamenco guitar is known as toque. Below are 30 flamenco toques for the guitar for each of the 30 Palos:

Flamenco emerged in Andalusia as a hybrid form of music and dance that is unique to this region, while maintaining a strong Near Eastern flavor in form and substance. The Near Eastern tone can be heard in modern Egyptian, Levantine, Mesopotamian, and Persian music, especially in the deep song (Cante Jondo), such as Cañas, Fandangos, Malaguenas, and the cheerful Zambra, Tangos,  and Rumbas genres of flamenco songs.

Flamenco has been commonly perceived as the exclusive cultural production of the Roma clans (known in English as Gypsies or in Spanish as Gitanos), who migrated from northwestern India around the 6th century to the Near East and then around the 11th century to Europe. However, since the 11th century, Roma clans inhabited various parts of Europe, yet flamenco music emerged in Andalusia. but nowhere else, such as Central and Eastern Europe, where Roma clans also settled. This is due to the fact that flamenco is a hybrid form of music and culture peculiar to Andalusia’s history, most notably due to the Arab conquest and settlement in Andalusia (711-1492) and their subsequent final phase of expulsions by the early 16th century Spanish Inquisition.

During the Inquisition and subsequent expulsion of the Arabs, many of the Arab peasants fell into a state of despair. Indeed, the very term flamenco is derived from the term fallah (Arabic for “peasant”) and mankoub (Arabic for “afflicted” and derived from the Arabic term nakba for “affliction”). The flamenco was born after the Spanish reconquest of Andalusia, when the afflicted peasant (fallah mankoub), as the historian Antonio Manuel Rodriquez Ramos argues, was stripped of everything, having nothing left but his hands to clap with, his feet to stamp on the floor, and his voice with which to express his catastrophic state of being (nakba). Alternatively, the peasant practiced flah al-mankoub, the prayer of the afflicted, beginning with shouting “Ay yay yay”, the deep expression of pain.

The form of many of the cheerful flamenco songs often begin with a deep chant and then transition into a happy melody. This transition can be more dramatically observed with the structure of the Soleá por Bulerías, where the Soleá derived from Salawat, (plural of Salat, and informally, sala) meaning prayers in Arabic. It strikingly mirrors the “mawwal”, a deep chant that precedes the lighter part of almost all traditional Near Eastern songs.

During the Inquisition few of the fugitive Arabs, hid and assimilated among the Roma clans, thus preserving the centuries old musical traditions that they brought from the Near and Middle East. The Roma clans subsequently developed them further about two centuries ago into new innovative and more complex 12-beat rhythms that gave rise to the genres of Bulerías, Alegrías, Martinete, and Siguiriya, while still maintaining the intensity of the music and profoundness of its lyrics.

The intensity of the flamenco song induces the performer and spectator alike to fall into a trancelike state of transcendent emotion that Federico García Lorca described in 1933 as the “deep sounds” or in Lorca’s own terms the “duende” invading the body. In the Near Eastern tradition, this exalted state is referred to as “ttarab”. It is often enhanced by rhythmic hand clapping and encouraging interjections of fellow performers and spectators calling the name of God (Arabic: “Allah!” transmitted to Spanish as “Alle!” or “Olle!”). Indeed, flamenco performers regard the profound song as a form of prayer, and thus, in the state of “duende”, the performer communicates with both the audience and the divine, or whatever that exalted state means for the performer.

Attracted by the uniqueness of flamenco, Spanish intellectuals, including Federico García Lorca and composers, such as Manuel de Falla and Manuel Infante, promoted it to a sophisticated urban public through the medium of modern art and classical music.

Today, flamenco is performed all over the globe by artists of various ethnicities, albeit due to its deep roots within their inherited family traditions, the Roma performers of Andalusia remain among the leading artists.