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NormanKliman -> RE: The Very Worst of the Mundo y Formas de Flamenco? (Jan. 20 2010 10:08:41)
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Flo: Glad you got through it alive, I know the feeling! I'm trying to get permission from someone to upload an excellent jaleos here but haven't heard back from the guy yet. BTW, I don't think anyone's mentioned that "jaleos" could also refer to a binary rhythm (a "tango extremeño").
Romerito:
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I am sure you know this-I do not mean to sound like I am preaching down...
Thanks for taking the time to word it that way. It's just our opinions, and you know a lot of stuff that I don't. For example, you brought up a good point, although I don't agree completely. I think I know exactly which part of his book you're talking about: He mentions the chord voicings, with the first string being the fifth of the A chord and the tonic of the E chord, right? I wouldn't argue with Manolo, for a few different reasons [;)], but my own research leads me to conclude that the only determining factors are the range of the singer's voice and possibly (this one is very interesting for me) the other recordings that were made in the same session. I've come across more than a few cases that I thought were a bit odd because the capo was way up high. When I looked at the serial numbers of the recordings (the original "matrices," not the record company's catalogue numbers) I saw that, for example, the guitarist had already used granaínas toque three times, so instead of accompanying por granaína with the capo at the second fret (C sharp), he accompanied por Levante with the capo at the seventh fret.
But in those cases, I'm talking about the broad category of cantes levantinos (granaínas, malagueñas and tarantas, mineras, etc.) where there's a lot more flexibility in this sense. Still, I posted earlier this year a couple of falsetas from very old recordings where serrana is accompanied por medio and siguiriya is accompanied por arriba. (Thanks to mrMagenta for pointing that out, because I'd missed it!) Happens all the time in siguiriyas, but that serrana was a big surprise. In your favor, I'd have to admit that that serrana is the only por medio recording I've come across so far.
Maybe I'm talking about a few exceptions that confirm the rule (that confirm what you're saying). But if we analyze 100 different singers, we'll probably find that a lot them sing in a similar range. This is pretty much what I've found. There are high voices and low voices and the toques that go with them (granaína for the higher ones and Levante for the lower ones), but some keys happen very rarely (D or D sharp for example). In fact, there's one recording of Montoya accompanying with the toque de rondeña. It's the only one I've come across, the key is D sharp, and Montoya had already accompanied that singer with toque de granaína that same year. But this is getting off track. What I'm saying is that the codification that you mention is IMO just a natural consequence of the human voice that gets reinforced over time through repetition.
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If it were only about cante then F# would be fine for Granaina and you will never hear that...
I don't want to sound like a know-it-all, but I think there are several factors to take into account to explain this. It's not easy to draw conclusions, but it looks to me like granaínas (cante) didn't become popular until well into the 20th century (1920s), and that coincided with the consolidation of toque de Levante for the cantes mineros. Before that guitarists were using toque de granaína and por arriba a lot more often to accompany the cante mineros. So my conclusion is that when granaínas became popular it gave guitarists a reason to reserve toque de granaínas for those cantes and to reserve toque de Levante for the cantes mineros. That helps to give these cantes their own characteristic sound and avoids the problem of repeating the same toque too many times on different recordings.
So I agree with most of what you're saying, but IMO (1) codification has more to do with natural consequences than "rules" of tradition, and (2) we have to take several factors into account if we want to take a guess at why guitarists accompanied with certain toques, and those factors are usually of a practical nature.
Ricardo:
Good one there, with Paco's soleá-caña; that's exactly what I was going to mention but didn't have a convenient reference at hand.
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Who was that singer?
I looked at both videos but I don't know what singer you mean. What DVD?
BTW, starting to home in on Porrina's tarant@. I think you're right, the range isn't that unusual.
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