|
Piwin -> RE: How many Falsetas to play well? (May 19 2017 10:13:07)
|
quote:
for me are the basics all that, what i can find in a flamenco book on the first sites like techniques like rasguedo and golpe, the compas and all other basic things to play flamenco guitar.
I hear you. That's pretty much why I was recommending a few hours with a teacher because most manuals I've seen aren't really good at covering those things. They'll cover technique, tell you that compas is this series of beats with these or those strong beats and then thow out a bunch of falsetas. What I'm trying to say it's dont think "basics for flamenco guitar", think "basics of flamenco in general".
One thing that can be kind of confusing in flamenco is how one term can refer to several different things (not totally different, but not exactly the same). Like when you say compas, as a general term that's the rythmic structure. But if someone says a guitar player is playing el compas, that refers to something a bit more specific. If you're playing a falseta, you're playing in compas (i.e. you're sticking to the rythmic structure, or at least you should be [8D]) but that's not the same thing as playing the compas.
That compas (the one Erik was referring to) is basically a rythmic line with usually more or less the same chords that everyone recognizes. It doesn't really have a melody over it or anything, just chords with a certain way of playing them (like the compas por bulerias is strummed and often has rasgueado in it, the compas por solea usually has some arpeggios in it, etc.). It's your baseline.
Functionally, it is what a guitar player would play when the singer would have to take a break. Say the singer finishes his verse and need to take a breath before the next one, the guitar player just plays compas. When accompanying a singer you don't play a falseta everytime he stops singing, there are rules about that too. And basically, a solo guitar piece mimics the structure of accompaniment. The falsetas are kind of like the singer's voice, and once you go through a verse, you take a break and go back to compas. That you can see very clearly in the video that Erik kindly outlined. If you follow along it should be pretty apparent what the difference between the falsetas and the compas is.
And then there are endless variations on compas, rythmic or otherwise. You could go on playing for a long time just playing compas and variation of it, without ever adding a falseta, and if you know enough variations it would still be an interesting listen (well, I think it would but others may not!).
My opinion is that at some point everyone should put the guitar down for a while and try to understand the structure of flamenco as a whole. So looking up things that aren't specific to the guitar. Honestly, that's the hardest part about flamenco. It's not the technique or getting a real fast picado or whatever, it's just understanding the structure, because it's just incredibly intricate with a huge amount of variations. It's just this big wall of information that everyone at some point has to try and scramble over. Anyways, hope that helps.
|
|
|
|
