The Editorial Ácana of Camagüey in 2014 published research Memoirs of the Ballet of Camagüey . The authorship of this text corresponds to Lourdes María Cepero Estrada who for many years served as the pianist of this group. Alongside this work, Cepero has served as a professor at the University of the Arts in its Camagüey branch and as director of the prestigious chamber music duo A Piaccere .

He previously published in the same publisher his master's thesis, The tangible spirit of sound. The music in the ballet with which he obtained mention in the annual research award of the Cuban Institute of Cultural Research Juan Marinello . With a solid musical training and a broad ballet culture, the author, in this book, delves into the difficult task of tracing the history of the Camagüey Ballet . Thus, not only the walk of what was an emblematic company for the country is preserved, but also the coordinates that gave rise to its birth and its performance until the end of the last century are traced.

There is no lack of enormous gratitude to that Maestro that was Fernando Alonso and the mark that he left in the training of choreographers dancers of this company. It was due to him, there is no doubt, the enormous national and international take-off of the dance group. The author also points out that:

The founders Manelín Rodríguez and Gloria Padrón kindly offered me their testimonies, as well as the teachers Menia Martínez and Lila Martínez de la Torre. I was also given interviews by the choreographers José Antonio Chávez and Osvaldo Beiro, the choreographer and director of the Endedans Contemporary Ballet Tania Vergara, Jorge Lucas Castellanos (Lucky), Jorge Lozano, Rafael Saladrigas, Elda Armengol and Diego Montoya. [1]

The interviewees provided important data on the dance group, but the author delves into the history of the region and shows how since the 19th century there was a taste for opera, ballet and theater together with a very special development of concert music . Suffice it to say that one of the figures who sang in 1850 in this city was Adelina Patti , so admired by our José Martí .

Therefore, the researcher follows the path of the cultural history that leads to and explains why this company today. The book contains the catalog of all the works premiered from 1967 to 2012 with its first dancers, choreographers, music and other information of interest.

May this text serve as an important contribution to studies about culture from a regional point of view on our Island and as an obligatory reference to any researcher of the history of dance who respects himself, since these pages are part of the cultural heritage of a nation that needs to be defended.

Notes.

[1] Lourdes Cepero Estrada: Memories of the Camagüey Ballet. Ed. Ácana, Camagüey, 2014, p.13