REVIEW | La Bamba - A Musical
The cast of La Bamba. Photography: Pamela Raith★ ★
Reviewer - Emmie
*Disclaimer: Gifted tickets in return for an honest review
Are you on the lookout for a vibrant dance musical that will keep the summer alive for as long as possible? La Bamba is just the ticket.
This new dance musical has been choreographed by one of the Strictly Come Dancing professionals and Italian Latin champion Graziano Di Prima. Inspired by the legacy of Rock ‘n’ Roll legend Ritchie Valens, who passed away at 17 in a plane crash known colloquially as the “day the music died”. At the centre of this show is Sofia, a young LatinX girl from Pacoima, California. She’s a girl with a big heart but even bigger dreams.
Featuring some of the most popular songs of the 20th century in this vibrant and bold production, this musical is predominantly told through dance, accompanied by a live onstage band. This show collects musical and dance styles from contemporary R&B to Latin folk music. La Bamba does a brilliant job of honouring the communities in Pacoima, particularly in recent years with the pandemic and political forces impacted on them.
However, there is a lot for this musical to work on in order to become an overall more polished and stronger product. Paul Morrissey’s writing is unfortunately weak with this production - it largely depends on the choreography to do the storytelling. Therefore if you are someone who understands dance as a narrative tool then this will be for you. The standard of some of the acting wasn’t as tight as I would have expected and some technical issues meant you were unable to develop relationships with the characters. Many of the key narrative points were also sung in Spanish which made it hard to follow the story - the use of captions would enable audiences to acknowledge and understand that specific part a lot better.
This cast certainly works hard with the material that has been provided to them and nobody more so than leading lady Inês Fernandez. Her portrayal of Sofia is endearing and her vocal ability is astonishing - especially when she articulates some of the songs that have a lot of material to work with. She certainly has a promising career ahead of her and I can’t wait to see where she goes next.
Siva Kaneswaran and Stefani Ariza support her well in their roles as Mateo and Elena, although it was technical issues that made it difficult for us to develop a relationship with Siva’s character.
La Bamba is a musical about the dance and it’s jam-packed in there. Graziano Di Prima and Erica Da Silva’s choreography is slick, well polished in the rehearsal room and the dancers manage to execute every beat of the undoubtedly explosive musical score. If you love Strictly Come Dancing then the style and presentation will definitely be suitable to your taste, but there is definitely room for more dynamics which would make a better overall impact.
The lively ensemble of 8 (Tristan Ghostkeeper, Brendan Graham, Luke Jarvis, Gabriella-Rose Marchant, Nicolle Matheu, Bethan Mitchell, Julia Ruiz Fernandez and Alex Sturman) certainly fill every inch of that stage and you will enjoy every second of their performances.
La Bamba is a new show and it will over time grow and adapt to the environment that it sits in, but did it need to be a musical? Maybe not. Maybe it would be better as a celebration of this community, Ritchie Valens’ story and the music in a more streamlined dance production. We’ve seen how this has been successful in some of the other shows we see from Strictly Come Dancing professionals.
It’s an inspiring move from the creative team and it will sell to very specific audiences during the tour. So if you are a fan of Strictly Come Dancing and want to enjoy some brilliant dancing, then these audiences will lap it up at every opportunity. I wanted to love this show as a fellow Strictly Come Dancing fan but also someone who loves to witness dance productions in a theatre - I will give this show time and revisit in the future.
Ticket information for the La Bamba! UK tour can be found here.
