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Flamenco and aire
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Ron.M
Posts: 7051
Joined: Jul. 7 2003
From: Scotland
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 Flamenco and aire
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I don't often (if ever) copy posts from other Forums and repost them, but this guy (Don from the FT) Forum wrote something so significant (to me, at least!) that I didn't want anybody to miss it.
He's replying to somebody asking him if his trip to Spain helped his guitar playing, and in what way.
I love the way he compares the style of playing in Jerez to what he's used to hearing at home in the USA.
Did the trip influence my playing?? for sure, no doubt man! I took lesson's from Juan Diego in Jerez and tried to go to every tablao, pena and concert performances during the Festival de Jerez..I really tried to experience everything as much as possible and sometimes stayed at Penas until 5am drinking some vino tinto or cervezas..doing palmas and jaleos etc..but hell no I wouldn't touch that guitar when it came around to me!! LOL! man those gypsies can play! wheew.. it was mind boggling to see first hand. What blew me away more was how much knowledge there was of flamenco, for example some college students came in a Pena where I was and after some drinks, these beautiful gitanas just jumped in and started dancing por bulerias in front of the guitarist just like that! and everybody participated regardless of age.
Overall, I think that I am a better flamenco now than before..I hope! Over there its not about what kind of guitar you own, nor how fast or strong you can play. Guitarist's there sound different from here IMHO, it seems that here in the States technique is the main thing we concentrate on, but there its all about Aire, feeling the compas and very earthy style of playing..man when you hear a buleria, its DEFINITELY a BULERIA! especially in Jerez. Its muy flamenco, it seems that what guitarist's are doing here are just as valid but over there it sounds much more flamenco..hope that makes sense :o)
Alright man, hope all this typing helped to answer some of your questions, I highly recommend you go to Spain, its a breath of fresh air or AIRE! alright man, back to practice.
Saludos,
Don
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date May 7 2004 22:15:07
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Miguel de Maria
Posts: 3532
Joined: Oct. 20 2003
From: Phoenix, AZ
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RE: Flamenco and aire (in reply to Ron.M)
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I think it's pretty inevitable... I mean, the guitar is a hobby for most of us, a profession for a few, over there, it seems that the guitar is just a jukebox kind of, an essential part of the party. It's more about the party than about the guitar. I think most people over here are guitarists first, who get into flamenco, and from the outside looking in, try to understand and duplicate this feeling and way. I just finished reading the rather substantial Carmen Amaya biography by Paco Sevilla... these people learn what flamenco is at a very early age and spend the next fifty years performing and jamming. I think what it feels like to be them is qualitatively much different than how it feels to us.
For example, Sabicas claimed that he and Carmen Amaya never rehearsed. What seems unimaginably complex and choreographed, to an outsider, is to them just a jam. These guys know flamenco, guitar, baile, cante, so well that they can learn things very fast and quickly integrate them into pre-set structures. I have been feeling a little taste of this lately, I have been studying a book by Manuel Granados that has a lot of typical falsetas for an assortment of styles. What would have taken me days to learn now just takes hours... I note how the falseta interacts with the compas, how the chords go, what the melodic motif is..and bam, new falseta. This may seem elementary to some, but it represents a lot of progress made for me.
The more structures, patterns, beats, melodies, and idiomatic devices you learn, the easier it is to integrate. I imagine that I will get better at learning falsetas after awhile until most of them can be roughly mastered in a few minutes, and then choreographies/pieces will soon follow, as most of them can probably be learned as a type of variant on X, etc. It's a fun, optimistic feeling--soon the hard work will be over and I'll be able to have fun and not rehearse like the greats! Well, we'll see if I get to that point or not.
The great advantage that the Spanish flamencos have over us foreigners is that incredible amount of exposure...to the point that the rhythms, melodies, palmas, cantes, are somewhat a part of their lives and certainly a part of their community memory and vocabulary. Certainly by long study and lots of carefl listening, added to hard analysis, we can learn this to a certain extent. As Simon said, flamenco is hard even without guitar. Now add that most of us are struggling guitarists, how hard this arte is to execute, then!
A lot of flamenco guitar uses devices which most of us have not yet mastered, fast arpeggios, golpes, picados, rasgeuedos...and of course if we don't have those down it will be hard to nail them in the rhythmic way so essential to Spanish music. But I think that if we pare things down, as Ron has attempted to do, we can get there, and if we work hard enough at our guitar playing we can incorporate the virtuosic things as well. Sabicas claimed he had the guitar in his hands whenever he could...someone who already was a virtuoso by the age of 18 or whatnot still couldn't get the bug out of his system. It's hard to compete with that, living and breathing guitar. My friend Miguel Rodriguez (I posted his website earlier) is somewhat the same...he already could play when he was a kid and, being a pro musician and not having much of a social life, he still plays hours and hours a day!
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date May 7 2004 23:59:57
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Miguel de Maria
Posts: 3532
Joined: Oct. 20 2003
From: Phoenix, AZ
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RE: Flamenco and aire (in reply to Ron.M)
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Well, I did see a couple crappy guitarists in cantinas that, in some aspects of their technique, were pretty well developed. For example, I saw a rumbero/tangero (is that a word) in Triana, who while rough and coarse, had incredibly strong picado. He also had a very nice strumming technique. But I don't even know if he knew what an arpeggio was.
Paco Sevilla wrote of Luis Molina, who was a contemporary of Ramon Montoya and was supposed to have lightning fast, crystalline picados. This is the same guy who wrote a biography of Paco de Lucia so I assume he meant it when he said it! He also said that Carlos Montoya, although a nephew and raised by Ramon, claimed not to have studied at all with him, also that Carlos has a more rhythmic and aggressive style, probably because he played for dancers and Ramon played for cantaors. This is funny to me, because the biggest complaint I hear about Carlos is his liberties with compas in his solo playing, a big no no in the modern world. Incidentally, according to Sevilla Carlos was by no means the first to give solo guitar recitals or concerts and was preceded by at least a handful of others. Although none of them must have ever achieved his level of fame and fortune!
By the way, Kate, I take it the kids over there don't laugh at your singing any more. Are getting the hang of it? Can you post a granaianas for us?
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date May 8 2004 18:05:58
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