SLIGO SPANISH SOCIETY - SOL Y SOMBRA

We are pleased to announce that our traditional Christmas Party will take place this year on Friday, December 9th in the Yeats Building, Sligo. Doors open at 7.30.  As is by now traditional, the great Mallorcan singer/songwriter Felip Carbonell will play a range of Spanish and Latin favourites for our enjoyment. There will also be Spanish food provided by Juani from Flamenco Kitchen , as well as plentiful wine and refreshments.  All of this for just €7! Students, the unemployed and students with the Spanish Society will only pay €5. ¡No te lo pierdas!

Sligo Spanish Society are pleased to present a talk and demonstration entitled The Cultures of Spain, with Irene González. The event will take place on Friday, November 18 th , at 8pm in the Yeats Building, Sligo. Spain has been politically unified for centuries, but a closer look can reveal the variety of nationalities, cultures, languages and identities that make up this fascinating, diverse country.  Sligo resident, Irene González, has a unique perspective on the various cultures of Spain: her family is from Galicia, in Spain’s North-West, and she speaks  gallego  at home with her family. S he was born and raised in Catalonia, in the North-East, and also speaks the Catalan language; moreover she has a passion for flamenco culture, which is based in the southern region of Andalucía, and she is an avid flamenco dancer; and yet she is still Spanish, and a speaker of the standard Castillian Spanish language that unites all Spanish people. Irene will tal...

We in Sligo Spanish Society are delighted to present Rafa Bocero in his first ever Irish performance. Rafa is a singer-songwriter from Cordoba in Spain, and will play for us on Friday June 3 rd , in the Yeats Building Sligo. The event starts at 8pm. Rafa has performed all over Spain, Cuba, Germany and Portugal, and has collaborated with various artists, including Lien y Rey in Cuba and Estrada Fado group in Germany. In 2013 his song  El Pasito  was used as an anthem by Cordoba football club, and was instrumental in forming a bond between club and fans that led to the team being promoted to the Primera Liga. His songs have also been used in various Spanish television programmes, including on the show Mujeres y Hombres y Viceversa, on the Tele5 channel. Rafa’s visit to Sligo is especially fitting as he is going to play live for the first time his song The Fiddler of Dooney, which uses the words of the Yeats poem of the same name which Rafa has set to musi...

COSTA RICA – EXPLORING THE UNKNOWN – FRIDAY APRIL 29 TH , 8PM. We are pleased to present a talk on Friday April 29 th on the fascinating Central American country of Costa Rica. The event will take place in the Yeats Building, Sligo at 8pm. The talk will be in English, and will be by Costa Rican native and Strandhill resident Maritza Loaiza . Maritza will tell us about the culture and food of her home country, as well as about the rich natural resources of Costa Rica. Costa Rica is a unique place. It was officially ranked the Greenest Country in the World in 2009, and it is known for putting a lot of emphasis on environmental protection. It also has the second highest life expectancy in the Americas and its health system has been rated better than many more wealthy countries. As many people know, it is also a country without an army, which it abolished in 1949. After the talk attendees will have an opportunity to sample some Costa Ri...

Last week we learned the very sad news that one of the founders of Sligo Spanish Society, María Lyons (neé Diaz Caneja) died in Sligo General Hospital.  It is a great loss for her family, friends, colleagues and fellow members of Sligo Spanish Society. She passed away at far too young an age. María came to Dublin in the eighties to work as an au pair, where she met her husband Philip. They married and lived in Limerick before settling in Sligo. They have two sons, Philip and Juan. María, along with her husband Philip and Irish friend Marea Foley, set up Sligo Spanish Society/Sol y Sombra in 2001 to cater for the Spanish community in Sligo and to provide a point of contact for those Irish people interested in Spanish culture. María helped organize many events, parties, celebrations and talks on all aspects of Spanish culture. She also ran a Spanish conversation group in McLynn’s pub for years, as well as teaching Spanish in IT Sligo. Sh...