NormanKliman -> RE: HELP!!! Solea de Triana (Chiquetete) (Aug. 16 2012 18:36:53)
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Again, my personal theory this is due to singers learning how to sing for baile in order to work, over time evolved the "box" concept, and improvisation changed from having the guitar "field" tonos maintaing compas, to singers "improvising" within the box. Your wording in that sentence isn't very clear. Are you saying that soleá started out and developed over time as an accessory to baile and that singers have recently freed it from that context? I must be misunderstanding you because I'm sure you know that (1) there is no dancing on the vast majority of recordings and (2) working for dancers is entirely circumstantial. About the second point, Spaniards who sing flamenco start doing so when they're small children and, even if they end up working for baile for a few years or the rest of their lives, nearly all of them know how to sing soleá without the confining/deforming context of dance. In its natural state (no guitar, maybe just some guys standing at a bar counter), soleá is usually sung fast and the tempo is kept steady, except when it gets even faster toward the end. quote:
OR....(perhaps in reference to your "mush" solea?) the guitar can be elastic with tempo, sort of keeping the singing "in the box" although changing the size of the box in the moment. Yes, that kind of dilation of the tempo is part of what I had in mind. Rigid tempo is not a good thing, either, but what I don't like is the combination of slow tempo and dilation. It's just a way to make things easier for the singer and, if you think about it, it's not too different from the speech patterns of someone who's had too much to drink, or the meandering path of that drunk trying to get home.[:)] quote:
Instead the good accompanist will follow the singers lead and let the singer take heat for it, if it might be bad taste or not. Yeah, I agree with that. All I'm saying is that a good accompanist should know traditional cante. quote:
I mean think about the fact that in the golden era the singers were MAKING UP their own cantes... How could that ever be a fact? All we can do is guess, and, actually, it looks like they were making small changes to existing cantes. There are many examples on my site. It's obvious that until recent times, a connection with the past has always been a fundamental part of flamenco. IMO, what's been happening in cante for the last 30 years is that some singers are trying to break away from the past rather than bringing it up to date. Throwing out the baby with the bath water, if you will. It's similar to the "liberty vs. licentiousness" debate applied to Spanish society (excess that comes with newfound freedom). Most young people today eagerly embrace modern trends and don't like "old-fashioned" things. If you ask about Mairena in Spain, it won't be long before you hear that he was an authoritarian figure who only wanted to squelch artistic freedom. Yet most singers today copy Mairena's siguiriyas, tonás and, to a lesser degree, his soleás. Nothing wrong with that, as Torre and Chacón served as models for many singers, including Mairena, but also Pastora, her brother Tomás, Mojama and Niño de Cabra, to name a few. The difference is that personal variations used to involve small changes made to cantes and nowadays it's "anything goes." quote:
So notice how the guy now suddenly like MAGIC has very sophisticated but PERFECT compas with his cante OLE!!!!: Yeah, look who's accompanying him. What, you've never kept a compasless singer in compas with your accompaniment? quote:
THAT is what the problem has evolved to with cante not moving forward, the idea of boxed in classic versions can't be changed much without being criticized ridiculed, and in case of young people, they will be "taught" how to do it "properly". Of course classic versions can be changed. It's exactly what Torre, Pastora, Tomás, Mairena and many others did (and very few are still doing). What those singers didn't do was to bring extraneous elements to their cantes (for example, a tercio of tientos in a soleá). I asked Vicente Soto "Sordera" if he thought it was difficult to create new soleás, siguiriyas and tonás. His answer was that the hard part isn't creating new cantes but coming up with something better than the classics. So I don't agree with your definition of "the problem." You don't have to believe me, but there are plenty of old-timers who like Camarón but aren't impressed by his anemic-sounding clones. As I said in my last post, I feel that "the solution" is the use of new or different letras for the same old cantes because it necessarily changes the melody (and puts the singer in a position to come up with worthy variations and/or new cantes). That and aligning cante and compás in different ways (what we've been talking about in this thread) are the best strategies to develop cante. Unfortunately, few singers are doing that nowadays. Of course, every once in a while, a genius like Camarón comes along and does things his own way. He wasn't even particularly good at soleá but that "Amarilla y con ojeras" cante of his (probably closer to bulería por soleá) is held in high regard by artists and aficionados alike. If you like, you could explain your comment a little: where's the criticism coming from and who's going to do the teaching, for example. I applaud your skepticism, because there's an awful lot of misinformation and nonsense out there, but not all of it is coming from the purists.
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