Uruguayan Folk Ballet / Ballet Folkorico Uruguayo
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Director Sydney - Luis Chiriff jr
This is our 8th year on the internet and not our last. This website started in 1996, it was hosted by geocities, as time passed the banners began to ruin the content. In 2002 I moved it to http://www.ufb.com.au. This was essential as a site about culture cannot contain banners of any sort, they are a distraction, it ruins the feeling of the site.

I took the position of Director as my brother, Diego, had to move to Melbourne. I didn't want the group to die, this is something that my family has been maintaining for the last 19 years. As you may know or not we take a great deal of pride in what we do. We are representing our Uruguayan culture to Australian public and it is vital that our performances are genuine and are not lost in the world of advertising or commercialism. This is culture, it must be maintained as is, authenticity is very important. We as a group define what are culture is to others that don't know it, we show parts of our culture and it would be wrong if we were to tarnish it by commericialising, adding 'showy' steps, adding things that didn't exist in that time.

Director Melbourne - Diego Chiriff
"Dancing has been more than just an every day dedication for me, you can say that it has been a way of life. I think I can speak for all of us in the group when I say this cause we all love it so much. It not just being able to show today's people how things used to be like back in the days in Uruguay, but also the interaction with the public of today other groups and the list of celebrities that we have met along the way telling us how beautiful our culture is. I think that all cultures have their unique beauties And that they should not be change to suit today's social standards simply because that would be undermining their own ancestors and lying about your own culture to people who want to learn or know why we of today are so proud, why we are able to go on inspite of the settlers who tried to conquer us and at another point in time the civil unrest where we had brother killing brother. All this history has influenced the culture in our people back then in which we reflect on how we are today. It is important to keep our authenticity to the best of our ability and knowledge to maintain history the way it was for our children. So dancing just to seek the public's applause for something with out heart or true culture and the value of its history is not worth while, to me you might as well join the circus. The Uruguayan Folk Ballet group was founded simply for these reasons. To show to the Australian public the different influences from other Latin American countries and also European countries that have enriched our culture being the way that it is today. And that our children of tomorrow don't forget who we were and where we came from. It is irrelevant to like or dislike one's culture it is there to learn from and remember. "
Creator - Luis Chiriff

Luis E. Chiriff

An Introduction Of Myself:
I was born in 1947 and disregarding my age I feel the responsability to carry on dancing in order to maintain our culture and traditions by passing on to others this love for music and dance.

When I Started To Dance:
I started to dance when I was 14 years old in a small group in a school around the block where I used to live back in Uruguay. Because in that group we could only perform at that school and we felt that we needed contact with other groups in order to learn more about dancing ,we then moved to a private academy whose director allowed us to use the patio to rehearse and I danced there for about 3 years , after I moved again to a bigger and a more professional group and I also performed there for a couple of years travelling around the country and meeting alot of important people of the Folk Dance Circle . From there one day I decided to quit for many personal reasons but again the same old friend that persuaded me into folk dancing (Humberto Rojas) approached me again and convinced me to be part of his new group 'Los Tacuareños' and that proved to be right. I performed with this group for another five years travelling around the country with the 'Cruzada Gaucha' and learning quite a bit under the direction of Nelly Mateos de Mateos and her husband Arcimis Mateos.

My Opinion Of Dancing Is:
To describe my opinion about dancing is not a easy task . We are talking about feelings , we are talking about expression , we are talking about the smallest gesture of your hands or penetrative looks . Dancing is a combination of movements and feelings following the rhythm of a music . There can be many different types of dancers in my opinion there are only too good or bad ones, there are some with great flexibility and memory to follow the steps of a choreography but without feelings and expression that's the bad one. The one that feels the music deeply in his heart and shows on his movements and the way that he deeply looks at his partner, that dance is more than just memory for the steps and flexibility, but it is his soul that comes out on the stage and nothing else exists but his partner. Only then the audience will be able to feel how he feels and this is how a performer can communicate with his audience.

Copyright © 1996 - 2006, The Uruguayan Folk Ballet.