As with all elements of ancient mythology, there is some blurriness around the Muses of Greek lore. Their number and origin have changed over the centuries, but the most common understanding is of nine goddesses, each of whom embodies one aspect of the arts.
It is this set of nine that forms the inspiration for Rafaela Carrasco’s Creaviva, a 75-minute performance playing as part of this year’s Flamenco Festival, which is formed of nine distinct movements, each one seemingly inspired by a different Muse. But if there is a narrative thread, it comes less directly from Greek mythology, instead suggesting a lonely woman for whom dance is the only company.
The elegantly minimal staging sees Carrasco’s accompanists – two guitarists, two singers and a percussionist – sit in a circle around a spotlit circle. Carrasco initially dances slowly around them in the half-dark, as if waiting for an invitation to take centre stage. As she does so, the percussive nature of flamenco starts to take hold, the dance providing the foundation to its own acoustic accompaniment. Those rhythms are complemented by the Spanish guitars of Jesús Torres and José Luis Medina and Pablo Martin Jones’s box drum.
Carrasco’s dress starts out with all the ruffles one associates with traditional flamenco, with the dancer gradually tucking up folds of the dress at her waist. This allows for a greater visibility of the dancer’s feet as she picks up speed, especially when accompanied by the coarse folk voice of singer Antonio Campos.
As the piece moves into other movements, Campos is joined in singing duties by Gema Caballero, offering a more plaintive and feminine aspect to the piece. With no English-language captioning, the full effect of the lyrics – some taken from or inspired by Greco-Latin culture – is not immediately accessible to audience members without knowledge of Spanish. The emotions involved cross language barriers, though, and the appreciative response from those in the audience who can follow the lyrics helps fill in the blanks.
There is a melancholy over much of the piece, but elements of pride, too. After Carrasco’s first costume is discarded, she emerges in a much more modern, ruffle-free red dress, perhaps symbolising a re-emerging fiery spirit after the dolour of the work’s opening moments. There is also a sense of progressing through the centuries of flamenco tradition, suggesting that as couture tastes change, the dance remains the same.
If that is the case, Carrasco’s final costume change celebrates an amalgam of the modern and traditional. Now in grey and white, the ruffles return on an impressive train that becomes its own character as Carrasco brandishes it in her resurgent choreography. If the first third of the piece is about loneliness and sorrow, and the second a reclamation of the dancer’s internal pride, Creaviva’s final movements are a resurgence of joy, a resolute assurance that flamenco is, in all its flamboyance and foot-stomping percussion, alive and well.
Whether or not the work truly embodies all nine of the Greek Muses would require a deeper understanding of the connection between each of the nine pieces and the Muse in question than can be discerned here. One feels almost certain that the final moments are inspired by Terpsichore, the Muse of chorus and dance. But the same could be said for the whole piece: Creaviva is an ode to the longevity, tradition and future of flamenco, wherever that inspiration comes from.
Reviewed on 18 June 2026
The Flamenco Festival runs until 29 June 2026
