Enjoying the process: La Emi continues to fall in love with flamenco journey

Performing on stage is part of Emmy Grimm’s DNA.

The Santa Fe-based flamenco dancer grew up learning the medium and has become a professional dancer.

Grimm, known on stage as La Emi, kicked off the season on July 5. It will run through Oct. 8, in Santa Fe.

She’s spent months planning for the season.

“Preparing for these seasons is always jam packed. This year we have brought on an operations manager to expand and strengthen our organization,” Grimm says. “Our preparation ranges from rehearsing, mentally preparing, creating new ideas for the performance and getting the word out about our series! There are always a lot of moving parts, but when we get to do what we love, it compensates for every minute of hard work.”

Grimm says this season will have guest appearances by Vicente Griego.

“We will also have singer, Daniel Azcarate, originally from Los Angeles, and guitarist Eloy Gonzales from Albuquerque,” she says. “We have two rotating featured male soloists, Carlos Menchaca, from San Antonio, Texas, and Fabian Sisneros, from Albuquerque. We also will be featuring three female core dancers: Janira Cordova from Santa Fe, Cienna Chavez from Albuquerque and Tessa Torres from San Antonio, Texas.”

Grimm says the performance features a variety of numbers that highlight both danza Española (a culmination of flamenco, ballet and folklore) and traditional flamenco.

“These choreographies will be a variety of group numbers, trios, duets and solos,” she says. “We will also feature numbers from Vicente Griego’s band, ReVoZo Rumba Flamenca, on the performances where he is featured. There is also a highlighted guitar solo. Several of the choreographies are choreographed by world renown artists, Gala Vivancos de Barcelona and Eloy Aguilar de Granada.”

To set the scene for the flamenco performance, Grimm and her team have upped the ante with lighting and stage prop ideas with Kyra Murzyn.

“The male dancers will be performing new solos and I will be rotating between three different solos,” Grimm says. “We have also brought in new costuming for some numbers.”

Grimm began learning flamenco as a child under the direction of María Benítez.

As an adult, Grimm continues to run her flamenco studio, EmiArte Flamenco, where she is teaching the next generation of dancers.

When she’s not dancing in Santa Fe or around New Mexico, she continues her journey learning from the flamenco masters in Spain.

“There is always so much to learn. On this last trip, where I spent six weeks in an intensive study with my teacher, Gala Vivancos, in Madrid, Spain, I learned one of the most important lessons there is to learn,” she says. “The beauty of this journey is that you never arrive at your destination, you need to fall in love with the process.”