Our physical headquarters is already preparing for the new 2025-2026 academic year. And it returns with the same enthusiasm to consolidate itself as a beacon of flamenco culture from Jerez to all the international communities that make up the great family of expoflamenco. (The album cover photo is by Óscar Romero)
This year, we are extremely fortunate to begin with the premiere of the new album by guitarist Alejandro Hurtado and which is titled 'The first cry'. The work, available in digital format and on vinyl on September 5, has been released in this year 2025. All the cuts are compositions by the interpreter from San Vicente de Raspeig (Alicante), considered today as one of the firm values of the concert guitar.
In illustrated discussion format
To get the best teaching and training performance from this event, we have chosen to stage a illustrated discussion formed by guitarists and teachers Norberto Torres y Roberto Sabater, who will be led, as moderator, by Jose Maria Castano. The protagonist, Alejandro Hurtado, will also participate in the discussion, but with guitar in hand, to explain, with live audio examples, some of the details and phrasings discussed in the album's tracks. Words and music fused in a first-class cultural event.
The illustrated discussion will be available free of charge on our platform on Friday, September 19th, starting at 22,00:XNUMX PM (CET). To access it, you only need to subscribe to the website. expoflamenco which is completely free and without permanence or commitment of any kind.
The album 'The First Cry'
Alejandro Hurtado's guitar in this new work has been surrounded by a excellent cast of musicians as David Domínguez (percussion and palmas), Javier Márquez (wind instruments), Inmaculada Salomón (castanets), and Lauren Serrano as sound engineer. The album was recorded at Filigrana Studios and mixed and mastered at Hanare Studios, both in Córdoba.
We recommend reading this article about the album written by our colleague Faustino Núñez, which can give you a very close idea of its great quality.
'The First Cry,' Alejandro Hurtado's new album – Magazine expoflamenco
The sonic itinerary that Alejandro follows in this, his third solo album, ranges from the Impromptu, which opens the album, to the soleá, sevillanas, habaneras, serranas, panaderos, petenera, bulerías, mazurka, tango and lullaby. A collage of creations that clearly shows the versatility of the protagonist's guitar. By the way, the entire album was played on an instrument made by luthier Pepe Romero in 2024.
First impressions
In the booklet that accompanies the album, Pablo García Mancha emphasizes the temporal embrace of the past and present of the flamenco guitar in the hands of its maker, 'that's why it sounds as current as it is ancient'. For his part, Norberto Torres, highlights 'the choral approach of the work' because it suggests several Alejandros during its journey, thanks to the double classical and flamenco training of a 'restless guitarist but with enormous respect for tradition and the forgers of the guitar' flamenco'That is,' Norberto concludes, 'the romantic music of the 19th century, renewed and contemporized for the 21st century.'
The author, Alejandro Hurtado
He already said it Master Fosforito, current Golden Key of the Cante: 'After working throughout my professional career with the best guitarists of my time, starting with Niño Ricardo and including the brilliant Paco de Lucía, I can attest to Alejandro Hurtado's enormous guitar ability, and I have no doubt that he is destined to occupy a privileged place in the world of flamenco guitar.'
Indeed, our protagonist has been marking out with a intense training The milestones of early success for his surprising mastery despite his youth. Since he began at the age of 9 at the "Vicente Lillo Cánovas" Professional Conservatory of Music and Dance in San Vicente del Raspeig (Alicante), his hometown, while also learning flamenco guitar from Pedro Alarcón, Roberto Sabater, David Cerreduela, and later, from the legendary guitarist Arturo Cerreduela "El Nani," from whom he learned the secrets of the Caño Roto guitar. He completed all of this with advanced studies in Flamenco Guitar at the Córdoba Conservatory of Music, which he completed with honors and an extraordinary end-of-degree award.
Next to the concert guitar has collaborated and performed with great artists such as Mayte Martín and Miguel Poveda. In the case of dance, his performances alongside Inmaculada Salomón, principal dancer of the National Ballet of Spain, and Rubén Olmo, its director, as well as with Patricia Guerrero and Belén Maya, stand out. At the recent Seville Biennial 2024, he was selected by the management to perform alongside maestro Rafael Riqueni on the same stage.
Has published so far two solo albums, this being the third, with great public and critical approval: 'Masters of classical art flamenco' (2022), compiling a series of compositions by Ramón Montoya and Manolo de Huelva, recorded with their original instruments and 'Sieve' (2023) with his own compositions and which was the best album of the year 2023 for our house, expoflamenco.
On awards chapter Worth mentioning, among many others, is the "Vicente Amigo" Award in the "Young People's Competition" flamencos de Córdoba» (2015) or the First Prize 'Bordón Minero' at the International Festival of Cante from the La Unión Mines (2017).
