Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Full Version)

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cavedave -> Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 14 2011 16:44:52)

Schubert, poor chap, composed for a very small group of friends yet his songs are now considered great art, with world wide appeal. Will the classic recording of flamenco acquire this status, OR are they doomed to become forgotten?

I am prompted to ask this question after listening to old rock tracks from my youth which now sound banal and are best left in the trash can.

My own opinion is that much that passes as rock or pop music is so shallow, emotionally and musically, that it cannot survive. While some of the Flamenco greats are creating music of real worth and so will survive.

What do you guys think and which Flamenco artist will make it into the future?



Ron.M -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 14 2011 18:41:55)

quote:

What do you guys think and which Flamenco artist will make it into the future?


IMO, cavedave....ALL of them.
ANYTHING of any worth will survive a future of bland advertising and consumerism, unrealistic hopes and promises by merely spending a few bucks.

In a society where having the fattest belly or being able to do the longest fart is worthy of a TV programme, then you can be sure that anything of real worth will last in the long run.

cheers,

Ron



Harry -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 14 2011 19:01:04)

I agree with Ron, but at the risk of making some enemies, I worry about flamenco artists like Vicente who are increasingly moving into pop realms. There has always been a division between high art and entertainment, and I am hoping Vicente's next effort will be a stripped down affair. Himself on guitar, two or three great singers and some palmas. Of course I could say the same about Paco and Tomatito as well.



BarkellWH -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 14 2011 19:06:41)

What do you guys think and which Flamenco artist will make it into the future?

Good question, CaveDave. If you mean which flamenco guitarists will achieve the flamenco equivalent of the status of Schubert, i.e., who in the flamenco pantheon will be considered "genius" years from now, even a century hence, in my opinion the list will be small indeed. Four will survive: Ramon Montoya, Nino Ricardo, Sabicas, and Paco de Lucia. They are the current "Big Four," and they will continue that role. All the others we like--Vicente Amigo, Manolo de Huelva, Melchor de Marchena, Diego de Gastor, and a dozen others--will survive, but only as footnotes.

Cheers,

Bill



Ron.M -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 14 2011 20:22:51)

quote:

There has always been a division between high art and entertainment


That's an interesting post, Harry...

There was a programme on Radio 4 this weekend about "The Old Grey Whistle Test"...a late night programme on the telly that started in 1971 and featured new and interesting bands..
All they had was some floorspace, a couple of lights and a couple of cameras.
The bands just brought their own gear, plugged in and played.
There was no time limit or script or anything...sometimes it just used to fade out in the middle of a song because they had reached the end of the programme's allocated time.

But over the years they showed first time UK appearances of some of the legendary bands of the 70's who were not mainstream pop...eg...Bob Marley..Velvet Underground..Lynyrd Skynyrd..Captain Beefheart..etc

As time moved on, the BBC noticed that it was getting pretty popular, so new producers were brought in who decided to give the programme a "makeover" including a new flashy studio set with good lighting and a "Top Ten" chart countdown review, "To make the programme appeal to a broader and newer audience".

The result.... a total failure.

The younger audience they'd hoped to attract didn't happen as they were all too busy watching MTV...while the dedicated audience they had acquired, lost faith in the programme's direction, presentation and featuring of top ten pop band's videos, so just switched off.

So the plug was finally pulled in the 80's, since nobody watched it anymore.

Yet the programme could have still been going to this day with today's generation, with it's orginal format of a staff of a presenter, a couple of cameramen, an electrician and a cleaning lady, showing interesting bands who nobody has heard of...all done on a shoestring.

Apparently, the BBC are now talking about making Radio 4 more appealing to younger audiences...

So it seems to me that any successful niche entertainment now has to broaden it's scope to include everything.

Maybe Foroflamenco should start some Bossa Nova, Jazz, Rock and Pop Forums to attract more members?

Jeez...

cheers,

Ron



XXX -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 14 2011 22:16:32)

If anybody knows how to divide good art from bad one without getting subjective please let me know. thx.



Ruphus -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 15 2011 12:52:32)

quote:

Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art?

I would think: "Yes", in the long run.

We are living in a period of detouched / descrete specialisation. Common knowledge disperse of informative ressource.
Should menkind survive the destructive outcome of status quo, the survival will be exclusively enabled through a coming trend towards integral thinking and understanding.
So, if there is a future it will have to be a much more rational and reasonable one.

If you will, a neo-classicistic area of re-discovering relevance of ways towards objectivity. A reform in philosophy, didactics; and upturn of logical capabilities.

In sight of the arts this will include tidying up with arbitrary heritage of Cold War US policies of intentional delute on artistic proficiency ( as an reaction to SU "Realistic Art"), that has led to works of incabality pecuniary ranking over works of retracable skill.

( Just days ago, I saw another example of an internationally acknowledged expert of modern art raving before a drawing. Estimating that it ought to be a Jason Pollock or Picasso, worth half a million USD; until the reporter told her that the picture was actually made by a chimpanzee. hehehe [:D] )

In my opinion art shouldn´t be a separate subject to beginn with. Like with American native cultures who do not have a special term for arts on the one hand, with everyone being naturally routined with making art work since childhood on the other hand.

If however art was to be a separate speciality as with western cultures, criteria inherently and logically ought to be correspondingly retracable in the same time.
Consequently, works of art must fulfill the two aspects of proficiency ( demanding craft ) and idea ( expression, effect, originality ) in retracable ways for the educated observer ( and his hopefully given overview on crafts demand and preceding inventions and works ).

In sight of music ( in my mind the most touching art of all ) with just seven notes and only so many ways of varying them ( under premisse of rhythm and harmony ), potential creation of actually original yet muscial new production appears to be a correspondingly tough challenge to the contemporary composer.
Creating something musically conclusive / pulling yet vastly original in the same time could be the most demanding task with contemporary arts.

Now ever more scarce white spots on the map of music only emphasize the dorado of past centurys sixth and seventh decade, which in terms of creativity was not preceded by any comparable period, nor will ever be repeatable; unfortunately.

The unique productions of those unmatched decades were not only based on the circumstance that most, from writers over players up to recording engineers had undergone more of intensive muscial ( and in sight of AEs: technical ) education, but for the great white plains of music still virgin and ready to be conquered back then.

In a future that can only be of advanced sophistication ( if at all ), original and musical productions, whether historical pieces or an ever smaller number of contemporary ones, should be increasingly appreciated by public.

People will likely embrace the old recordings of artists you mentioned above, and musicians like Grisha, gifted with the technical proficiency to perform works of Sabicas & co. will probaly be highly rewarded by audience.

Their performances will be captured by then perfected digital recording and post-work means, superceding todays best DSD and played back through mind-blowing gear of immediacy and spatiality.

- Just as our fine wooden guitars of now might become the "Stradivaris" in a future of carbon fibre specimens.

Ruphus

PS:
I found Ron´s telling about "The Old Grey Whistle Test" very interesting and comprehensive.
( Last weekend, on German TV there was a retrospective of an old TV program called "disco". Crazy to see what muscial quality there used to be yet with the rather simplicistic category of disco music.)



Morante -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 15 2011 14:40:41)

En el futuro, se recordarán a los cantaores.



NormanKliman -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 15 2011 15:09:52)

The story goes, or at least the version that I heard, that Camarón was offered "a million pesetas" to play at a party for Mick Jagger but he refused because he'd never heard of him.



Ron.M -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 15 2011 18:12:03)

quote:

Camarón was offered "a million pesetas" to play at a party for Mick Jagger but he refused because he'd never heard of him.


Hmmm..Norman..

I kinda think it's a million peseta urban myth myself..[:D]

Actually there was a case in court here in the UK decades ago, where the defence had made references to the high antics of Mick Jagger in support of the case of their client.

The ancient judge leaned forward and asked the Clerk of Court...

"And who is this..this.. 'Mick Jagger?'..."

It was reported widely in the press at the time as a sign of how out of touch judges are with reality. [:D]

cheers,

Ron



Kate -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 15 2011 19:25:32)

quote:

ORIGINAL: NormanKliman
he refused because he'd never heard of him.


Morente turned down an invite from Octavio Paz as he had no idea who he was.



Doitsujin -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 15 2011 20:34:49)

Must something be old to be considered "great art"?

The things Paco, Vicente and some others are doing with their guitars is legit to be called art.. .. OK.. its declared. Flamenco is art now. Close the thread. [8D]



NormanKliman -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 16 2011 7:49:39)

Ron, anecdotal veracity aside, the point I wanted to make is that any definition of "great art in the future" is going to depend on several things. For example, not many people know who Antonia Gilabert Vargas was. Maybe a few hundred people know that she was also known as La Perla de Cádiz, and maybe a few thousand people around the globe know who La Perla was. But she and many others only known by their artistic names are already important chapters in the history of flamenco (as is the anecdote about Camarón). I'm willing to bet that you know only a few people who know who Manolo Caracol was, and that you'll agree that that doesn't make him any less important.

I contend that if an artist is admired by aficionados in several parts of Spain, that's about as good as it's going to get, and that that kind of status isn't lasting. Silverio was very well known in his lifetime but today nobody remembers him or his cantes.

quote:

Must something be old to be considered "great art"?


In flamenco, yes, but "old" might be just a few decades.



XXX -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 16 2011 8:54:13)

WTF is "great art"? [&:]



NormanKliman -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 16 2011 9:12:07)

quote:

WTF is "great art"?

Haven't you got some definitions? I have and I think you do too for the flamenco that you like. When enough of the right opinions coincide it's great art. It remains subjective though because you're always free not to like something.



XXX -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 16 2011 9:27:53)

quote:

ORIGINAL: NormanKliman
When enough of the right opinions coincide it's great art.


Im glad you said that. So in the end it boils down to people agreeing on something, and not necessarily being reasoned by the qualities of the art itself (i.e. in an objective way).

For example, you can prove that Paco brought some innovations to flamenco guitar. But you cant prove they are any "good" without using your tastes.

The confusion of taste with knowledge (and vice versa) is the main thing EVERY art discussion suffers that i have seen until now. In my opinion, this is due to that people feel the need to give their tastes a reason. As if it was a fault of their tastes that it has no reason. Kind of same principle when people searching for god to reason their existence. No need for such things IMO. Same goes for bashing other arts as being inferior to flamenco.



Doitsujin -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 16 2011 10:42:51)

I think its difficult to call "old" flamenco art.. like that it would be oficially seperated from modern flamenco. And there are already more modern things than the older modern things..

It should be all treated the same. If flamenco is art,.. all flamenco should be included. Actual almenco and all before.



Ruphus -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 16 2011 12:30:47)

To say it with the words of a brother in crime, named Bravin Neff:
quote:

"Am I the only one that tires of this "everything is subjective" watered-down-pop-culture-pseudo-philosophy ****?"


Taste has all to do with empirics and knowledge. And art is just as liable to objective criteria as any other specialisation.
The more educated the observer be on demands of a craft and on foregone works of a genre the more he will be able to pinpoint taken efforts and invention behind workpieces.

Which is not to say that there wouldn´t still exist matters of individual taste yet among educated stands, but that beforehand insight is providing competence of judging.

The problem with the zeitgeist and its silly trend of "everything is subjective" being that envogue brainwashed don´t know what it does to civilisation whenever related criteria of subjects are being baselessly watered down to nonesense of arbitrariness.
They do not fathom what it means when e.g. clumsy "painters" occupy market shares of actually gifted artists who consequently can hardly pay the rent for humid basement studios.
They don´t understand the loss of culture in place when a Paco Pena or J.J. Cale will hardly fill a schools atrium, while thelikes of Lady Gaga filling stadiums in a blink.

They don´t get what dismiss, trash hype and ignorance in the end means to cultural level and same to humanity.
They don´t understand that the "watered-down-pop-culture-pseudo-philosophy" that they consider to be trait of oh so generous "tolerance" and "philanthropy" in fact is being the exact opposite of the latter; detrimental to cognition and in the end considerably contributing to general injustice among people.

Instead of trendy parroting zeitgeist, how about autonomous thinking?

If you want to know whether or which flamenco to be special enough for being called "art" or not, take an approach to at least basic guitar playing yourself, so that you will obtain an idea of what might equal demanding playing and what might not. Next check out flamenco discography chronologically as thoroughly as you can, so that you will discover what refined phrasing and originality is.

After all that you will find certain works to be outstanding in terms of creation; those will very likely be worth naming art indeed.
It really isn´t much more complicated than that, although way more demanding than just deluting the term of art to contradictive undefinition in dependent mind.

Should you however still fancy that metiers couldn´t be subjected to objective criteria, maybe don´t research about specialists before an eventual future surgery.
After all proficiency must depend on the eye of the beholder and can´t be circled in anyway. Right?
Just as anyone could chisel the Pieta, isn´t it.

Jeez ... [&:]

Ruphus



XXX -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 16 2011 13:25:46)

Lady Gaga or "watered-down" pop music is not there to match YOUR tastes. It is there because of other people's tastes. The mistake that you guys are making is that you think the world music in general should match your tastes. That is also the reason why you mock about widely spreaded music like pop music, and not death metal or any other sub-culture music, which might equally contradict your tastes than the pop music you find so annoying.

All theories of a hierarchy of music styles or art have not understood what art is about IMO. Long time ago I started learning music theory to find out "objectivity" in music and guess what, there is no way to show that one style is better than another.

To add this: of course i regret flamenco music being not more popular. But the reason for that it is MY taste. Not because i think it would be "great art" and people needed teaching on this.



Ruphus -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 16 2011 14:58:22)

I used to think that insight on music theory would reveal differences between lullabies and demanding structures.

Anyway, I got a canvas with randomly splashed oil-paint.
It is supposed art. ( Guaranteed chimpanzee-free! )
Wanna buy it for a neat 30 000 bucks?
( Shipping on me.)

Ruphus

PS:
Watering down was not referred to objects, but to zeitgeist´s fashion of judge.

PS2:
quote:

It is there because of other people's tastes.

Initially wrong. People´s taste is there because of undemanding consume and marketing strategies.



XXX -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 16 2011 20:03:32)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Ruphus
People´s taste is there because of undemanding consume and marketing strategies.


If I were a bad minded guy I could accordingly to that logic say if there is a market for brainwashed people (claiming marketing strategies as reason for peoples tastes and buying decisions is implying nothing else), why there shouldnt be a market for the elitist people, who want to consume certain things ("great art") because they want to express their status or "knowledge" of music by that?

I dont know, people who are more into pop are definitely easier to get along with than people of other music styles who think they are on a mission to convince everybody of the beauty and superiority of their beloved art. If you present flamenco with this attitude to other people for sure you will p*ss off alot of people.

Make no mistake. I can imagine why there arent any productive (if i may say so) answers to my post. What i write here is blasphemous for anybody who thinks his tastes are reasoned by some high(er) force or logic. Some logic that could constitute "great art", if applied properly.



mark74 -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 17 2011 1:00:31)

Deniz I agree with you

I also think that much of the pop-flamenco coming out is some of the best popular music in the world right now

The UK and the US used to produce decent pop music, but its so freaking weak these days



BarkellWH -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 17 2011 1:26:47)

quote:

I also think that much of the pop-flamenco coming out is some of the best popular music in the world right now


This line is a total non-sequitor, if you consider the original question. CaveDave originally asked if anyone thought that classic recordings of flamenco might achieve the status of great art, and he used the example of Schubert. That "much of pop-flamenco coming out is some of the best popular music in the world right now" is not only simply an opinion open to debate, it says nothing about whether or not such music will be appreciated a century from now, the way Schubert's compositions are appreciated today.

Frankly, I think "pop flamenco" is about as impressive as "bubblegum music" was in the 70s and early 80s. Perhaps people will be listening to it and appreciating it in the next century as 'great art," but I, for one, doubt it.

Cheers,

Bill



mark74 -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 17 2011 1:39:14)

I dont't know anything about Schubert, but I like a lot of the bubblegum music from the 70's and early 80's....I'd say after Paco my favorite musician of all thime is Robert Smith....all I know is the pop music they turn out these days in the anglophone world is pretty sad, but the scene in Spain seems pretty impressive



Ruphus -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 17 2011 12:24:24)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Deniz

If I were a bad minded guy I could accordingly to that logic say if there is a market for brainwashed people (claiming marketing strategies as reason for peoples tastes and buying decisions is implying nothing else), why there shouldnt be a market for the elitist people, who want to consume certain things ("great art") because they want to express their status or "knowledge" of music by that?

I dont know, people who are more into pop are definitely easier to get along with than people of other music styles who think they are on a mission to convince everybody of the beauty and superiority of their beloved art. If you present flamenco with this attitude to other people for sure you will p*ss off alot of people.

Make no mistake. I can imagine why there arent any productive (if i may say so) answers to my post. What i write here is blasphemous for anybody who thinks his tastes are reasoned by some high(er) force or logic. Some logic that could constitute "great art", if applied properly.


If you stick to superficial questions of prestige, there is no way for you to approach an actual core of the matter.

Your assumption that there were to be no levels from incapability to proficiency, no such thing as trivial and demanding products, in the end renders whatever kind of development into none-existance. Including human evolution.

Species came about through specialisation. Seals for instance specialized on diving, so that they could hunt fish; sharks and bears specialized on sniffing out food from miles away, and hominids as easy prey of mighty carnivors found a way towards intellectual expansion.
Brain work as means of survival over 7 mio years, resulted in human being.

By reputing that whatever intellectual tendency, namely triviality was to be just fine, you are advocating inhuman conditions. Supporting given insanity of needless and exploited cluelessness, cruelty and destruction.


While things like primitiveness and monotony in music seem not to exist for you, upbringing with complex, versatile and harmonic music products have everything to do with intellectual development of a person.
And the latter mustn´t be elitist, but humanly adequate in the first place.
For what is catching fish for the seal, is differenciation capabilities for homo sapiens.

The watered-down-pop-culture-pseudo-philosophy makes you pal with the above mentioned expert of "modern art", only that demonstrating nonesense of arbitraryness as in her embarrasing case before the TV-camera was easier to do in the realm of painting than it would be in the one of music.

For, after all it is clear that you would be in a position to hear it when a chimpanzee went into a recording studio.
-


If let aside what you so far must be deeming to be PC / apparently human friendly, in place of such considering causalities, maybe at a time you will discover existance and relevance of cultural level as determination of human being.

And if wanting to know where exactly at the end of the "everything is subjective area" of BS, human being is at today, take notice that in the meantime we are self-evidently and dazed living at the brink to Nirvana, with envogue other-wordliness not only effecting ourselves, but a planet; likely edelweiss within the next billions of galaxies.

Overpopulated menkind living on undertax of trivial level means not only inadequate but lethal status.

Ruphus



XXX -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 17 2011 18:56:35)

"Great art"




Ruphus -> RE: Will classic flamenco recording acquire the status of great art? (Feb. 18 2011 10:15:58)

Can´t access youtube currently.

But I don´t have the impression as if you were actually interested in rethinking about the topic.

Ruphus



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