MARINERA - peruvian's dance

MARINERA - peruvian's dance

La Marinera: a whirl of blinks, movement and sexy smiles ...

White handkerchiefs that seem to float in the air. Vibrant sound of guitars and "cajones" (typical musical instrument made of a wood box), of drums and bugles. Claps that accompany and mark the rhythm and that become accomplices of a fine courtship, of a romantic persecution.

The man, straw hat in hand, imitates the walking of an energetic steed and surrounds his couple. The woman, coquettish and barefoot, comes closer while she smiles and shakes her skirt... and it seems that she is accepting the courtship, but then she escapes overflowing grace and sensuality.

This is La Marinera: a whirl of blinks, movement and sexy smiles. A retinue dance in which love is born of the magic movement of the handkerchiefs and that, as they say, represents the impossible romance between a turkey and a steed.

Being the most popular typical dance of Peru, different schools and dancing styles exist. La Marinera Limeña (original of Lima, the capital city), is of moderate and elegant movements; the Northern one, full with romance, imitates the cadence of a Horseback Riding, while the Marinera Puneña has an Andean shade.

La Marinera is danced in almost every corner of the country, but it is more popular in the north coast, mainly in Trujillo, city considered as the capital of this dance, because as their same residents say, couples fall in love when dancing it.

The Capital of "La Marinera"

Trujillo, surrounded by amazing archalogical remains - as Chan-Chan the biggest citadel of mud in the world - is a romantic, dreamer and bohemian city that has conjugated perfectly their colonial reminiscences with the characteristic shades of the modern cities.

Capital of the department of La Libertad, Trujillo is located in the north coast of Peru, 550 kilometers from Lima or 50 minutes of flight.

Been founded in 1534 by the conqueror Diego de Almagro, the city of the eternal spring, shows with pride its large houses and colonial churches. Among them, the Ganoza Chopitea Mansion, of polichrome Baroque style facade, crowned with a rococó front and two lions; the house of El Mariscal Orbegoso, the house of La Emancipación and many others.

The Cathedral, for its sober architecture and Baroque style altarpieces, The churchs of San Francisco (thanks to its rich collection of altarpieces), La Merced and El Carmen, are temples that should be visited. And in this city of large houses and temples loaded with nostalgia and romanticism, they surrender cult to the most representative dance in Perú: La Marinera.

Trujillo is considered the capital of the La Marinera by many reasons. One of them is the National Festival of La Marinera that is carried out every year at the end of January and that had its origin during the decade of the 50's, thanks to the efforts of the famous Guillermo Ganoza Vargas.

The festival iincludes the National Competition of Marinera, a party full of youth, color and beauty, in which couples coming from different cities of the country compete in diverse categories at the Chimú Coliseum of Trujillo.

At the present time, El Club La Libertad promotes the competition and is the one in charge of keeping the tradition. During this celebrationTrujillo gets transformed and it is common to see spontaneous dancers everywhere.

During these days the best dancers will be appreciated. When being carried out in a small living room La Marinera is characterized by its slow movements and by the accompaniment of the "cajón", the claps, the guitar and the singing. The gear in these cases is quite simple.

When the couples dance in the coliseum the movements are more graceful and the structure of the choreography more complicated. The cajón and the guitar are replaced by the bugles and drums of the music bands.

Women wearing a tight skirt to the waist and men dressed with a white shirt, black pant, poncho and straw hat look very elegant and attractive.

La Marinera also gets dressed of elegance in September, due to the celebration of the International Festival of the Spring, a one week duration contest, in which different artistic activities are developed -among them the representative dance of Peru - and whose maximum expression is the Flowers Parade.