Music: Dance Like a Man

Vicente Escudero, 60-odd, all but forgotten as the past master of the Spanish gypsy dance, sat in his room in Madrid reading a letter from France. "You have been the eagle of the dance," it said, "and it is not indecorous for you to become the emperor of instruction." It ended with an invitation to head a dance academy at Paris' famed Salle Pleyel. Escudero accepted, but Old Dancer Escudero, a man who never bothered to count his money, had no cash to make the trip.

So it befell last week that Vicente Escudero danced...