Pedoviejo -> RE: I Dreamt I Slept in Marble Halls...Sin Picado (Por Favor)!! (Jan. 5 2004 4:28:33)
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This is actually a follow-up to all the above. (Rather grandiose of me, I know, but that also is flamenco.) Lots of ideas flowing there. On picados: One of you essentially said that “because they can” is the reason new players use picados. I agree. Everyone responds to the speed, the flying notes, like a joy ride. Monteverde did it, Paganinni did it, to name but a very few in the “classical” music world. Especially for young players, it’s like young men on motorcycles and in fast cars: It’s a thrill, and especially because they’re either too young to really know life-long debilitating injury or death, or do know of these things (e.g., war veterans) but haven’t absorbed or dealt with the experience yet. Speed is also very relative: The less your ears are tuned to it – i.e., being able to hear all the notes, to hear the inflections, etc, which takes lots of careful listening – the faster it sounds. It’s a blur. I used to think Carlos Montoya was fast on picados, but that impression soon disappeared. When I was living in Madrid some 30 years ago, I thought Serranito was the fastest and cleanest guitarist I ever heard, he of the 3 finger picado. This last year I acquired the re-released CD of his 1971 LP, “Serranito: Virtuosismo Flamenco”. I hadn’t listened to my LP in many years, and I was surprised when I listened again to this recording because his picados weren’t nearly as fast or as clean as I remembered. Paco blows him away, hands down, using only 2 fingers. And Paco can play much cleaner as well – when he wants to, though he hasn’t really tried to play completely clean since his early twenties. In any event, maturity brings change – IF there’s other things to go along with the ability for speed. Which brings me to PDL versus Vicente versus whoever: PDL could play the fastest picados of anyone ever when he was a teenager. But Paco had been completely and totally reared in a flamenco environment, and he had tremendous maturity for his age. He might do some picados in live performance as crowd pleasers, but he always knew their proper place: Everything in his technique is subordinated to the music, because he completely understands that technique is never an end in itself but only a means to an end. When Paco does a picado run, it’s always “right” for the piece. And Paco is another Mozart: A complete and total musical genius fortunate enough to have been born to a parent who understood music, appreciated the talent they had on their hands, and directed all of the child’s energies to that end. (How many Mozarts were born to the wrong parents and ended their lives sweeping floors?) Paco’s genius displays itself on all levels: Absolute mastery of technique, unerring rhythmic sense, incredible innate sense of musical good taste, and tremendous creativity. Any one of those abilities would make someone be considered a “great” guitarist. It is the possession of all of them which separates Paco from all others. Unless you musically “grew up” with Paco, it is difficult to appreciate this. Paco has so influenced everyone around him, has “shown the way” such that it has become “the norm,” that it is very hard to realize how much he has done – and how much you are hearing from other guitarists and in other quarters has actually come from Paco. One needs a musical retrospective, listening to recordings over a period of weeks in chronological order, to begin to re-create the progression and hear and understand how it came about. Only in that way can one hear and see what Paco did. It is to hear Paco’s progression from Niño Ricardo through Ramón Montoya to Sabicas, the tonal, melodic and compositional influences of Esteban Sanlucar, Mario Escudero…. Serranito was known to go into a rage if anyone mentioned Paco as the best guitarist back then. Manolo Sanlucar alone of Paco’s generation was able to both love and yet resist the Paco onslaught, keeping and nurturing a wonderful, highly individualistic sound that was “not Paco” and yet very flamenco. Yes, there were also many other fine players, but when one considered the whole spectrum – creativity as both a soloist and accompanist + making the audience want, need to shout Ole! - there was only Paco and Manolo. Tomatito, as Carlos Sanchez, a friend of mine and professional from the late ‘40’s through ‘60’s, once observed, Tomatito is a “Paquista”. Tomate has wonderful creativity, technique and good taste, but his drive, his rhythmic sense and so much else is pure Paco. It should therefore come as no surprise that Vicente Amigo learned from both Manolo and Paco (what an enviable training!), and as a result, he has a unique sound. As Gerardo Nuñez once said when complimented on his incredible technique (and I paraphrase): “Yes, but the real trick is to have your own sound. THAT’s the hard part.” Moraito has his own sound as well, but nothing near the dynamic range of melodies, technique, etc. to be considered a great soloist. But all that being said, I find it absurd to call Vicente “the next PDL.” I personally love Vicente’s stylings. He’s an incredible guitarist and creator, particularly in his ability to wring so much from such apparent simplicity and have it “say something.” However, excuse me, but someone who seriously calls Vicente Paco’s successor* has much to learn. Vicente’s toque is evolutionary. Paco’s was revolutionary. (* Paco reportedly said just that – but it was in response to a question along the lines of, “who of the new guitarists would you consider your successor?” Paco was referring to refreshing creativity that nevertheless remains true to flamenco.) Interesting those comments about Vicente’s “darkness” and “sadness.” If you hear the guy speak you soon realize that he has a very sharp wit. E.g.: “It’s Paco’s fault that I’m a guitarist.” But perhaps as with many people who have very keen senses of humor, there’s a deep, sensitive and romantic side as well, perhaps what the humor is there to protect and disguise. Both come through in Vicente’s playing. As to the “lack of classical training” and yet the possession of a classical knowledge of music: I quote from the introduction to a classic work on composition, “Harmony,” by Walter Piston: “There are those who consider that studies in harmony, counterpoint, and fugue are the exclusive province of the intended composer. But if we reflect that theory must follow practice, rarely preceding it except by chance, we must realize that musical theory is not a set of directions for composing music. It is rather the collected and systematized deductions gathered by observing the practice of composers over a long time, and it attempts to set forth what is or has been their common practice. It tells not how music will be written in the future, but how music has been written in the past.” In other words, it is the study of the products of musical genius, of that which has been deduced as the more or less common practices of those of talent – which in turn enables one to appreciate new genius: Those who know the rules, either by instinct or study, yet apply them in new and surprising ways, or even break them with pleasing results. But the only way to fully appreciate that is to have a sufficient knowledge base with which to compare. It would be like someone with no prior experience with wine being poured a glass of an outstanding vintage from an outstanding producer: It’s hit or miss whether they would even know it was good, but a virtual certainty they wouldn’t know how good. To continue the analogy, genius in a wine maker could produce a White Zinfandel or Nasty Spumante that would completely surprise and please the most knowledgeable connoisseur. As has been said many times (Hemmingway in “Death in the Afternoon” for one), in any art “knowledge enhances enjoyment.” But it also raises the bar: The more you know about an art, the more you look for something new to intrigue you – and the harder it is to find. When you’ve heard years of flamenco, you still crave more, but you also want to be surprised. The dancer’s turn that you expected just at that spot, but suddenly ended in a completely unexpected way; the falseta you’ve heard hundreds of times, you nodding your head knowingly, then suddenly and pleasingly surprised when it went in an unexpected direction. That’s what many of the new players try to do. Some do it successfully – and usually with subtlety. Many others try to do it with “weird” harmonies, new tunings, but the result may be less than pleasing and the guitarist has to tell us what the hell the palo was he just played and we’re ignorant outsiders for not knowing without being told. So as I see it, three things are required of any artist to produce art of consequence: Talent, exposure and dedication. In other words, born ability, luck in being reared in the appropriate environment, and sufficient desire to practice, practice, practice. What makes Paco so rare and unique is that he has all three in abundance. For those of us in this forum, some might have the first, some the third, and some both the first and third - but in each case the misfortune of insufficient exposure (the reason why we’re on the Net in English). I’m also surprised at all the talk on McLaughlin. For shear speed, Al DiMeola has them all down, and incredibly clean too. McLaughlin was fast, but not as fast nor near as clean. But in return he had a certain “bluesy” touch that said something, whereas DiMeola was all technique. Cold as ice in whatever he did. But other than those shows I don’t know McLaughlin. I can say that when Carlos Sanchez and I were talking to Paco backstage (about 20 years ago) McLaughlin came over with a smile and offered us each a Heinie. Very nice and affable. You might also be interested to know that Carlos chided Paco for playing as part of a speed-freak trio, and Paco’s response was, “But Carlos, I’m learning a ton of things!” (“Pero Carlos, ¡estoy aprendiendo un montón de cosas!”) Paco said years later that the flamenco guitar was mostly complete unto itself, but what it had lacked was harmonic dynamics. It was the music-theory based methodology of jazz that Paco was learning with those guys – and getting paid for it, and becoming known outside of the small world of aficionados as well. Not a bad trade. And finally to Kate’s observation that great flamenco can happen without a guitarist: But of course! For much of flamenco’s history there were never enough knowledgeable guitarists. Guitar is only one expression of flamenco, sometimes indispensable, others not. Listen to those “a palo seco” versions of bulerías on albums such as Miguel Proveda or La Macanita, amongst many others. One of my epiphanies came after I had played professionally (i.e. got to tour and got paid for it too) for some time, when I had been living in Spain for a few months at that point. Until then all the dancers I had any experience of were always in costume when they were performing. Without the whole fig they were only “rehearsing.” But then I was at this party, and one of the hosts who appeared middle aged and was wearing a dark suit with no tie, wanted to dance. He wasn’t a professional, just Gypsy and aficionado. He didn’t have the dance-studio bearing or moves or footwork. Yet, it was the first time I ever saw bulerías danced they way it was supposed to be danced. No one had to tell me either. If you were there you would have known instantly as well. Nothing “studied” and nothing feigned, no pretenses and no tricks. Just pure, wonderful, joyful bulerías. Some with guitar. Some without. See again the above statement from a master composer about music theory. Pedohondo
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