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I came to the conclusion that Tomatito's solo records arent for my taste.
I enjoy his playing on most of the youtube videos (the "legendary bulerias" is what got me into flamenco totally by accident) but his solo albuns have only 3 or 4 cool songs and the rest is... meh.
He sounds confused, the melodies seem to be just sudden bursts of notes that dont have a flow to it, I wouldnt even call it jazzy because they seem to go nowhere.
Posts: 15725
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
RE: New Tomatito CD out soon (in reply to Sr. Martins)
quote:
He sounds confused, the melodies seem to be just sudden bursts of notes that dont have a flow to it, I wouldnt even call it jazzy because they seem to go nowhere.
I used to feel the same way of his style vs say Vicente Nuñez Sanlucar etc, but over time I realized his way to compose is with very concise and effective falsetas that don't necessarily need to be stitched together in any special way as they function perfect for context of cante accompaniment, taken on their own. But put together randomly they don't make compositional sense, and are not supposed to. Nuñez for example has very involved sections of music that just won't work in context of cante (unless modified and elements sacrificed), but vast majority of tomatito's music is that way. For that reason there will be different tastes on the issue of flamenco guitar solo styles and that is normal.
RE: New Tomatito CD out soon (in reply to Ricardo)
quote:
ORIGINAL: Ricardo
quote:
He sounds confused, the melodies seem to be just sudden bursts of notes that dont have a flow to it, I wouldnt even call it jazzy because they seem to go nowhere.
I used to feel the same way of his style vs say Vicente Nuñez Sanlucar etc, but over time I realized his way to compose is with very concise and effective falsetas that don't necessarily need to be stitched together in any special way as they function perfect for context of cante accompaniment, taken on their own. But put together randomly they don't make compositional sense, and are not supposed to. Nuñez for example has very involved sections of music that just won't work in context of cante (unless modified and elements sacrificed), but vast majority of tomatito's music is that way. For that reason there will be different tastes on the issue of flamenco guitar solo styles and that is normal.
I was just talking with someone about this the other day. I totally agree. In this respect I think Tomatito is most similar to Moraito. Overall, I think that individual falsetas that can exist independently and out of compositional context are more traditional than something that is designed for use exclusively in a particular -- particularly, solo -- context.
Iam pretty ok with falsetas that can exist independently or else I wouldnt even enjoy flamenco I guess..
The thing with Tomatito's style is that his melodies over each chord within a falseta dont usually have a natural flow, it sounds like the melodic idea being developed over one chord suddenly stops and a new one begins on the next chord.
Iam not saying that he does this all the time but thats what my ear captures most of the times he does some modern/jazzy stuff. Its like if he was just filling each chord with some notes which seems to be the opposite of what VA did on his new record, every note serves a melodic purpose there, even in fast passages.
Posts: 15725
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
RE: New Tomatito CD out soon (in reply to Sr. Martins)
quote:
Iam not saying that he does this all the time but thats what my ear captures most of the times he does some modern/jazzy stuff. Its like if he was just filling each chord with some notes which seems to be the opposite of what VA did on his new record, every note serves a melodic purpose there, even in fast passages.
I get you, but his general thought of expression is rhythmical not melodic. He jumps away from the "flow" or melodic arc for rhythmic reasons. He has exceptions to that trend, but so does vicente have some jumping disconnected things. Check out his falsetas por bulerias with jose merce, very different style than what he uses on his solo albums.
Posts: 15725
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
RE: New Tomatito CD out soon (in reply to Sr. Martins)
quote:
But even more awesome is what he did with El Pele on "La Fuente de lo Jondo", his playing sounds totally different from his solo albuns.
Well, most of that is Isidro's guitar work (manolo sanlucar's brother). The solo accompaniments are just Isidro at least, and the other stuff duet style probably more along his line than Vicente. Vicente's personal "voice" or style appears for Pele's second album, also much less traditional or orthodox than the first.
RE: New Tomatito CD out soon (in reply to Ricardo)
quote:
I used to feel the same way of his style vs say Vicente Nuñez Sanlucar etc, but over time I realized his way to compose is with very concise and effective falsetas that don't necessarily need to be stitched together in any special way as they function perfect for context of cante accompaniment, taken on their own. But put together randomly they don't make compositional sense, and are not supposed to
That's a helpful observation. But am I wrong in thinking "A Miles", the soleá por bulerías on "Aguadulce", is an exception to this? It sounds a lot more compositionally cohesive than his earlier work.
Posts: 1156
Joined: Dec. 6 2006
From: Hamilton, ON
RE: New Tomatito CD out soon (in reply to Ricardo)
quote:
ORIGINAL: Ricardo
quote:
He sounds confused, the melodies seem to be just sudden bursts of notes that dont have a flow to it, I wouldnt even call it jazzy because they seem to go nowhere.
I used to feel the same way of his style vs say Vicente Nuñez Sanlucar etc, but over time I realized his way to compose is with very concise and effective falsetas that don't necessarily need to be stitched together in any special way as they function perfect for context of cante accompaniment, taken on their own. But put together randomly they don't make compositional sense, and are not supposed to. Nuñez for example has very involved sections of music that just won't work in context of cante (unless modified and elements sacrificed), but vast majority of tomatito's music is that way. For that reason there will be different tastes on the issue of flamenco guitar solo styles and that is normal.
The strange thing is that Tomatito's bulerias videos on youtube got me into real flamenco but his albuns dont have that raw and exciting feel that I got from the videos. Even the guitar sound on this new album.. too sterile for my taste.
Pa la pimpi is a good example of a great way to start, beautiful vocal melody and then.. nothing happens, the song just keeps chewing itself. In fact I feel that this happens to lots of "modern" flamenco. Anyway, my preference goes to those old albuns where the guitars sound like "plunkety-plunk" and the vocals are almost screams
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