AMG Review of Arriba!

Ted Mills
All Music Guide

Yes, many a Spanish kitsch album was released in the dawn of the jet-set era, loaded with castanets and the sounds of the bullring. But Hugo Montenegro shows his mettle with this album, which in others' hands would have been unlistenable. Montenegro's arrangements of traditional flamenco tunes are full of surprising turns and twists, and his use of the rhythmic feet of the actual dancers puts this heads above other such themed albums. For what it is, Arriba! is daring and different.