estebanana -> RE: Great Grand Daddy of Flamenco (Dec. 29 2012 20:27:13)
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Not to be a downer or anything, but I think the guitar is not really important to the origins of flamenco as it's really is about song forms and the development in some cases of compas in those forms. The stuff Amat wrote down came from somewhere, probably the street, taverns, stables butcher shops places where guys gathered to drink, play music and dance after work. And pick up chicks. "Moojhairs" if you will. Maybe some of the women also played the music, you never know, they probably did and certainly sang. My point is that in the 16th century and earlier there was a huge class division in Spain an Italy that was carried on to the mid 20th century in many rural areas. Spain was still feudal in structural a sense in many rural areas in the early 20th century. So you have a class that worked an was not paid too mach attention to by the classes that had upward mobility or what was considered a cleaner life in doors and with privileges like being able to afford paper goods. Those in the mobile classes often were literate while those in the working caste were almost always unlettered, illiterate. Most of them did not know how to write. They probably could not afford paper in quantities it would take to write a book, and why would they buy paper if they were illiterate? That is an expensive way to wrap fish. We do know that the standards for making instruments at the time were high and that there were guild examinations in which apprentices had to do some pretty amazing wood working to become journeymen. And at the same time there were instrument being made which are no longer extant, but documented in the writing of the times. To pass the Examine de Violeros in Spain in mid 16th century one had to build a "vihuela made from pieces " this as opposed to a guitar or vihuela carved from one single hunk of wood. There was a kind of instrument of lesser sale value that a lower classed person could get, or even make them selves which consisted of a large chunk of wood with an integrally carved neck. The outer shape of the guitar was carved and then the body was hollowed leaving the neck sticking up above the body. They were carved from the same piece of wood. The problem with the integrally carved neck instrument made from log essentially is that is tended to fall apart over time because the grain went tin one direction while it passed through the form of the guitar or vihuela. This meant the grain changed direction in the vital areas of the body where stresses and drying basically tore it apart. These instruments were common, not decorated and not collectable by anyone wealthy enough to own with large dry house with ample storage who could pass it down generation after generation to be preserved. However the "Vihuela made of Pieces" was highly ornamented usually, as were lutes and viols and were kept by the literate classes for generations. Those are the instruments we have extant today in museums collections, not the logs carved for the boys in the taverns. Funny thing is the logs that were made for those with less money and little if any education were loaded onto ships bound for The New World, sailors and priests took them to the Americas and introduced them to the people who lived there and these instrument structures stayed in the the lexicon of instrument construction until today. Examples of the integral neck solid wood one piece body style can be found in instruments all over South America and Mexico. One example would be the Mexican Jarana. The instruments that came with captains, governors, jesuits and their staffs were often of the pieced variety which cost more and were more ornate, also fell apart rapidly in the humidity of the West because the joints and pieces were glued. So where does all this go? Let me take you on side trip first to the viola da gamba swamps. The gamba family instruments came from the medieval fiedels, vielles and violas da arco. Basically a vast number of regional variations on the idea of a thing you held to your shoulder that was made of woods carved and sandwiched together and played with crude bow of rough horse hair. Eventually these would be turned into the violin that the structure would become more or less codified. Then later in the 20th century a series of fat bald Jewish men would become known as the best of the best of the fiddle players. Surely you've heard of the greats like David Oistrach, Issac Stern and Viedelle Castro? Anyway, the viol family can me set on the knee Paco de Lucia style with crossed legs and chords can be played on it. The gamba has the same tuning as a guitar and it has frets. Hmm....let's see, an instrument that can be bowed or strummed, tuned like a guitar and it existed a 100 years before Amat was born and played in the "Paco Position". That ain't no missionary tale. To conclude I would like to thank my proud sponsors, Chevron, Nestle, BP, The Trilateral Commission and former US President Jimmy Cartier. As William S. Burroughs would have said: "You connect the dots, you pick up the pieces."
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