Mario De Los Santos
Early Life
Mario de los Santos Gil López, flamenco dancer known in the world of flamenco art under his own name Mario de los Santos, was born in the Andalusian city of Algeciras on February 24, in 1988.
Career
He spent almost his entire childhood in the neighborhood of La Bajadilla with part of his family materta, from which he inherited his great love for this art. From a very young age he was acquiring knowledge about flamenco and dance through some of their relatives and people close to the family who are art lovers, as well as the occasional bailaor anonymous and visualizing through videos renowned dance masters such as: Mario Maya, el Guito, Antonio Canales, Manuela Carrasco, Isidro Vargas, Manolete, Rafael El Negro, Adrian Galia, Juan Ramírez, Carmen Amaya, Antonio Montoya Farruco y Farruquito, Juan Ramírez among many others, putting their dance steps to the test at flamenco parties and in the street when any meeting between flamencos took place. Naturally, the love and attraction that I felt for flamenco since I was a child, with the passage of time it turned into passion and desire to share his art with the world, which led him to take it more seriously. At the age of 16, he began taking classes with the dancer Noelia Sabarea, also from Algeciras, from who learned the structure of the dance according to the different styles and consolidated his base as a dancer. During his training he also took direct classes with Fuensanta "la Moneta", David Pérez, Belén Maya, Juan de Juan, Antonio "el Farru", Alfonso Losa, Enrique Pantoja, Miguel Cañas, La Lupi, Antonio Canales, Javier LaTorre and Eduardo Serrano "El Guito. He learned a lot from his experiences with the professionals he met about his modality and about flamenco in general. Upon completing his flamenco training, Mario concentrated even more on his personal way of expressing the dance, a natural dance, without forcing, pure, manly, strong, sensual, without ties, elegant. A mix of what he has lived and learned from this art along with his way of feeling life. A materialized reflection of what he himself is, always clinging to the traditional, to the roots of flamenco. In his career as a professional he has worked and collaborated with different artists of this genre, being the dancer of several flamenco groups and creator of the group “Amigos del flamenco” and “¡Agua! Flemish". She has also been a member as a dance figure in the flamenco companies of the dancer and choreographer Noelia Sabarea, from 2010 to 2015. With which she has toured various places within the country and abroad, participating in the Festival "Viva Flamenco" in Poland in 2010 and at the Libreville Intercultural Festival (Gabon) in 2014. In the Flamenco Company of the guitarist Salvador Andrades, participating in all the important events in the region, among them the 3rd Paco de Lucía International Guitar Meeting and in many others outside of it and which he has currently organized together with several colleagues the show ´´Esencia flamenca´´ directed by the guitarist. He was also a member of this same company in the Middle Eastern countries Oman and the United Arab Emirates. In 2019 he was part of the dance cast of La Cía Duende de la bailaora Mercedes Alcalá, also participating in numerous events held in the region and in the Auditorium of the Castillo del Marqués de los Vélez in Cuevas de Almanzora (Almería) and in which include his role as El Tuerto, the husband of the protagonist in the show ´´Carmen, passion and hate´´.
In 2019, the great international pianist Diego Valdivia also set his sights on him, adding him to his company. With the latter he has participated in the Festival De La Luna Mora de Guaro and at the International Piano Festival "Antalya Piyano Festivali" (Antalya, Turkey) that same year and in 2021 at the 7th Paco de Lucía International Guitar Meeting (Algeciras), which was the starting signal to start a tour throughout Andalusia and some other places outside the Andalusian Community such as Extremadura and Guadalajara. Apart from everything mentioned above, since 2018 the artist has been at the head of his own company named Mario de los Santos Flamenco. Formed by artists from Campo de Gibraltar and Jerez de La Frontera, having created four of its own shows in two years with which it has toured most of the Venues, Theaters and Festivals of Campo de Gibraltar and neighboring Ceuta. Its participation in the circuit of Peñas Federadas de Andalucía (2020, 2021 and 2022), organized by the Andalusian Agency of Cultural Institutions, through the Andalusian Institute of Flamenco, together with the different provincial federations of flamenco clubs with the show " Baila Flamenco" at the Peña Flamenca Pepe Montaraz, Lebrija and the following year at the Don Cecilio Cultural Center, Seville, for the P.F. Sing to the Air. And in 2022 in Cádiz, at the Peña Flamenca Sanroqueña de San Roque. To this day, his company has four flamenco shows: INDOMABLE, REIVINDICANDO, BAILA FLAMEN.
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