Exitao -> RE: Diego del Gastor > Son de la Frontera? (Oct. 6 2008 1:20:40)
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Deniz, I do recognise that buzzing is acceptable and unavoidable in flamenco. And, yes, it adds distinctive colours to the music which you could call part of the flamenco sound. The difference between players with good technique and those with lesser, is that the better players tend to buzz less, and the buzzing either compliments the music, or at least doesn't interfere with it. I thought this was elementary, I'm sorry if you think it was more complicated and was something the hinge a war-effort on. Frankly, I just didn't bother answering that part of your post because It wasn't as important a line of thought to me as it seems to have been with you. I had bigger fish to fry and didn't expect you were looking for details to attack me with - ad hominem attacks do not qualify as arguments. Opinions don't qualify as useful for arguments either. Look, if you have problems with the words I use, don't blame me blame the language. But please don't tell me that folk doesn't mean what it means without at least looking it up in an English dictionary. Flamenco is folk music. Those are its origins, the method of learning or transmitting this piece of culture plays a big part in what it is. So notation is part of what kind of music it is. Just as reading and writing your own language are a part of your culture and how people in the culture learn their language and that in turn informs (and even perpetuates) their place within their culture. Culture, subculture and the transmission of culture, that's all sociology 101. I have not ignored that things change, everything does and I'm not oblivious to the fact that change is the only universal constant. However, if flamenco changed enough to not be folk, it would not be flamenco puro. If you remove large parts of it from its framework of culture and tradition, it's not folk, and it's definitely not going to be flamenco as we see it now - and the divisiveness between old and new school flamenco will be very clear with old schoolers saying that "ain't flamenco." Whatever it becomes will be just as flamenco as Jesse Cooke or Ottmar Liebert. Falla and someone else who's name I can't recall tried to elevate flamenco music and create large works and even flamenco opera. But it wasn't, and still isn't, flamenco. Don't believe me? Try playing it at a juerga and see how it's received. (Not a criticism, but how many people here have ever even been present at a juerga? Can anyone who's been to one really try and claim that Flamenco is truly cross-cultural?) Rain, the vast majority of people who will listen to flamenco puro, not the more appetising performances PDL and other internationally known artist put on won't be terribly receptive. They won't get it. Except for musicians, without prior experience with the culture most people won't even be able to notice that there are different palos. My Latin American friends don't even "get" flamenco. They like rumbas and catchy stuff, but cringe at canto jondo. As far as their concerned, it's almost not even the same language. So what now with a speaker of English, or Dutch or Chinese? Go to a place with live "flamenco" and the performers actively discourage the audience from attempting to join in with the palmas. If the average person can't even clap hands in time... I don't even know (maybe someone who's travelled or perhaps Kate or Steve or someone who lives there can tell us) if your average Andalucian can do basic palmas. Try asking a person who doesn't know anything about flamenco to listen to an alegria and then ask them if they could tell that it was supposed to be a happy song. Christ, I speak Spanish fluently and I couldn't figure that one out until I'd listened to about 50 different alegrias. I can even remember the exact song and singer(s) that made me understand that the song was happy and how alegrias were able to be happy and sad/soulful at the same time, and without the language it might have taken a whole lot longer. Classical, baroque, opera and other "high art" forms of music that are lyrical tend to have lyrics in many languages, flamenco doesn't. Let's try to translate flamenco letras to our own languages... I think I'll start with "Estoy sentenca'o a muerte..." You don't think that would sound silly in English do you? Flamenco is not cross cultural enough to qualify under your criteria #5 and the enjoyment would be superficial, like a person who "enjoys" trailmix but only eats one kind of nut and one kind of fruit without ever delving into the bag to find out how much variety there really is. You know, the kind of person who doesn't know much about art, but knows what he enjoys... Furthermore, for people who live in that culture, it's not complex. If it's complex to us, that because our experience with the culture is too limited. It's not our culture so we have to intellectualise it to simplify it in terms we can grasp. Does folk connote "low" to you? Does the expression "common people" signify "low class"? When common people are the norm and are the centre of the bell curve, we need to realise that there's nothing pejorative about the folk who surround us every day. Odds are, over 90% of us in the foro are folk. And if anyone's not folk, PM me please because I need the use of your money and influence, thanks in advance. I used classical music as an example of high art based on its history, the skill set required to compose it (i.e. education in theory), the accessibility to that skill set (the number of musically literate people has risen exponentially and yet there are so few great composers), and the skill sets required to perform it. The only thing universally accessible about it was passive enjoyment. The folk origins of flamenco should be obvious. Anyone can learn to rap on a table. Anyone with talent could learn to dance (did you know there's even criticism from some corners about dance schools? Their product is "real" flamenco; which should be lived. Is what Sara Baras does really flamenco, or has it become some arty thing that's flamenco-esque?), and until Segovia came around, the guitar had always been a folk instrument. What's more flamenco, sitting in theatre at a Paco Pena concert, or being at a gathering, party or juerga actively participating, even if it's only palmas or table-rapping? But let's look at your point #8, does flamenco have a history? Hmm... earliest transcriptions? Etymology of the name of the genre...? Um, was that Flemmish or land-less, or are those just sorta theories? Why, of course flamenco has history, everything does, however until only recently, like all folk art/lore, flamenco's was transmitted orally and by example. So, if I may be so bold, let's rework lemma #8 and say "High art has a recorded history..." #9 Flamenco is supposed to be formulaic. There's a basic palo with only a few ways to play it, Yes you can individualise it was your personal style of playing, your choice of falsetas any your into, but even those follow a kind of guidelines. Because if you screw with it too much they can't sing or dance to it. And if you can't sing or dance to it, is it flamenco puro? So if a piece is high art, and individualistic, you can't have the singing and the dancing and improvisation that make flamenco a pure and living art form. See the dilemma? This brings us back to Deniz' question quote:
Why? Only because your definition of flamenco is about the culture and gitanos(C) doing it, instead of the music, the art? No, not gitanos, I'm pretty sure that Andaluzia was populated with more than just Roma, but Deniz was the one who brought up Cepero, who indicated in an interview that flamenco quitarists need to get out and live it (just google: cepero interview), directly after stating that he thought modern players have technique his generation didn't have. It's not my definition, but it's a definition I have to consider. I watch youtube videos of live social performances and the think about this compared to CDs and concerts - there's a definite basis for this definition. I haven't lived flamenco, so all I can do is learn and ask questions. No one has to participate in my question asking if they don't want. In part, this confusion relates a bit to Diego del Gastor. Some foreigners who were interested in the music met a man who played well, but more importantly played so expressively that they understood what he was doing without needing any kind of cultural translation. That's why they made him their flamenco guru.
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