The University at Albany Department of Music is pleased to present The Art of Flamenco Guitar, a concert by internationally acclaimed flamenco guitartist Maria Zemantauski on Wednesday, October 10, 2007 at 7pm in the Recital Hall of the Performing Arts Center on the uptown campus. The program will feature music ranging from classic flamenco of the Spanish gypsies to Nuevo flamenco with borrowings from jazz and other contemporary styles.

Zemantauski last performed at UAlbany in the fall of 2005. She is one of the world’s few heralded female flamenco guitarists, and one of even fewer female flamenco composers. She has performed in Spain and across the continental United States to great acclaim. Her albums, Mrs. Laughinghouse (1997) and Seeing Red (2000) have received stellar reviews from Flamenco Connection, Dirty Linen and music critics around the world. In May of 2004, Zemantauski marked her premier performance in Sarzana, Italy where she was invited to represent the United States at the 7th International Acoustic Guitar Summit.

Zemantauski's programs are a dynamic blend of artistic freedom, innovation and tradition. While she believes that the expressive possibilities of the guitar are limitless, she feels that the indigenous voice of her instrument is found within the flamenco art form. She has claimed this genre of music as her own with passion, confidence and grace.

With a masters degree in cultural anthropology, Zemantauski has focused much of her research on images of diversity and gender ideology within the performing arts. Often combining both performance and sociocultural analysis, she is a frequent guest lecturer at colleges and universities; among those are the University of San Francisco, University of California at Santa Cruz, the Eastman School of Music, Ithaca College School of Music, St. Lawrence University, California State University at San Marcos and the University of Kentucky at Lexington. She is strongly committed to promoting the arts as a vital educational component and an integral part of society.

Voted “Best Acoustic Guitarist in New York’s Capital Region in 2007” by Metroland, the publication lauded Zemantauski with these words: "She may play a nylon-string guitar rather than the more common steel-string flat-top, but don't be fooled -- classical/flamenco ace Maria Zemantauski doesn't pussyfoot around on those six strings and twenty-odd frets. She can set bass notes rumbling like an avalanche and treble passages flying like sparks off a blowtorch if she's so inclined. Around here, she is unmatched for both chops and the power to telegraph emotion that all art aspires to."

Tickets are $8 for the general public and $4 for students and may be purchased through the Performing Arts Center Box Office. For further information, contact the Box Office at (518) 442-3997 or visit the Performing Arts Center website at www.albany.edu/pac.

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