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I have many times wondered about the relationship of these great figures of flamenco. They have made something like 10 albums together, yet on Youtube there is only one (1)!!! video of them playing together, and it is not from a dedicated concert-performance of the two as well! How come??? Has noone asked this question before?
This has been discussed before. Paco became quite famous playing solo concerts at the same time he was recording his first records with camaron. Paco has a big respect for the role of the accompanying guitarist as a support for the singer. His job is to make the singer really shine. So he admitted that at the time he was becoming well known for his solo playing, he played with a singer (not named) and was embarrased because the audience was responding more to his falsetas then the singer, and after the concert they jumped him for his autograph and ingored the singer. He claimed he was so embarrassed that he chose to never again perform for a singer in concert. You can see that not only did he not turn up on youtube accompanying camaron, but no other singers either from the early 70's to the 80's, and even then, only his brother.
Starting in the 90's he decided to use his fame to promote young singers not well known as part of his group, but not in the traditional guitar/accompanist format. The reason for the single performance of Paco and camaron together, it seems it was a special TV show dedicated to PACO where he got to perform or see a performance of his favorite artists. Included in the program were also Ravi shankar, Manuela Carrasco, Jan Akkerman, etc. and Entre dos aguas performed by the orchestra.
There is a beautiful bootleg performance of Paco and Camaron live in a Peña, and the two really were amazing together. You notice how Paco gets as many cheers as Camaron after a falseta. Again understand, that kind of thing was embarrasing for Paco, and probably for the singers that he worked with too.
Amazing! The man is a phenomeno! Imagine being sooo good that you cannot function in any type of duet or ensemble playing, because you just draw the attention. Poor Paco
Still, without ever having heard that, I kind of feel that Paco and Camaron did not have a really calm relationship, but perhaps this falls into the category of gossip
Evolutionists (and their enemies) are especially interested in "missing links" between various groups of organisms, in order to better show how evolution works to transform one entity into another. Stratos and Ricardo have indentified a moment in the history of flamenco--the era of PdL and Camarón--when the hundred-plus-year-old idea of flamenco as cante-centered music "evolved" once and for all into "flamenco" as guitar virtuosity. During that window of time, Camarón and PdL both rose from obscurity to become the equally-famous, equally-matched partners on the see-saw of interaction between cantaor and tocaor. The growing popularity of guitarists like Sabicas, Carlos Montoya, Mario Escudero, in the preceding decades, prefigured by R. Montoya et al, had smoothed the path for the transition to guitar-dominated flamenco, and the PdL/Camarón partnership marked the point of final equilibrium, after which cante increasingly became the poor relation, the stepchild of flamenco.
In another post I also commented on the fact that cante is really only for the (relative) few. The real audience for cante remains small, and constant, despite the growth of interest in "flamenco". While the audience for flamenco was small (mostly aficionados, especially of cante), it was understood what the relationship between singer and guitarist was. The growth of the worldwide audience for flamenco reflects the growth of interest in guitar and in dance, as these aspects of flamenco are much more acceptable and understandable to the larger audience than is cante, a vocal music marked by "untrained", harsh rajo voices singing in an uncouth and almost indecipherable dialect of Spanish. Audiences prefer Andrea Boccelli's smooth cooings to El Borrico's throaty lung-clearings by 1,000 to one. And both virtuoso guitar and sexy Spanish dance represent the romance of Flamenco and of Spain far better than the moanings of some old hag. José Greco once said that all women wanted to be loved by José Greco, and all men wanted to be José Greco. Ditto PdL??
cante increasingly became the poor relation, the stepchild of flamenco.
In another post I also commented on the fact that cante is really only for the (relative) few. The real audience for cante remains small, and constant, despite the growth of interest in "flamenco".
I think there is a lot of truth in what you are saying. But I am not quite sure about cante not being popular nowdays. Over the last years, having attended quite many flamenco shows, I have witnessed a BIG growth of interest on cante by the audiences. Despite the fact that many of these people do not speak spanish (i lve in Greece), they seem captivated by cante, more and more. I have seen people get bored by virtuosic play on the guitar, and then a cantaor starts to sing and you just see the heads turn!
Insulting cante is childish and myopic. There are 3 parts to flamenco, each essential.
As to the relative popularity, count the number of cante cd's released every year vs. the number of solo guitar cd's. Go to Spain and ask which is more important.
The real reason cante is not popular in the U.S. is simply the language barrier.
Stratos, I'm encouraged by your observation of the growing interest in cante, in Greece anyway. There are certain qualities that are shared by the indigenous musics of Greece and Spain, that perhaps are less familiar and less congenial to more northern audiences.
Veet, if you were led to believe that I was insulting cante in my post, I apologize for not making my post very, very simple. Also, if you have the figures for relative cante/solo guitar CDs released each year, that would be informative. Regarding Spain, I would hope that cante remains important there, and I'm delighted that you tell me it is.
Veet, I can't decide whether you cannot understand my post or, rather, that you will not (choose not) to understand it. Assuming the former, lets just say that the characterization of some particular example of cante as the "moanings of some old hag" would be, I believe, the reaction of a huge number of not-very-knowledgable members of the worldwide "flamenco" audience. You and I would regard the same performance as the heartfelt and authentic utterance of, say, La Fernanda or La Piriñaca. As an example of what I'm talking about, here, verbatim, is a review from amazon.com of the CD Flamenco Fiesta (Sabicas, et al, accompanying Enrique Montoya and Domingo Alvarado):
"At the beginning of each track you get to hear a little bit of the guitar playing that I bought the disc for, but then all the horrible sounds that is supposed to be singing I guess, starts in and ruins any expected enjoyment. I went out to the balcony and sailed it like a frisbee." Ada Steinhauser
See what I mean? If you still don't understand my post, get somebody to explain "irony" to you.
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(sorry, couldn't resist.) 
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