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RE: early history of rondeñas
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Ricardo
Posts: 14806
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
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 RE: early history of rondeñas (in reply to aloysius)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: aloysius
quote:
The earliest recordings I have heard are from Juan Gandulla accompanying cante, like 1909 or before... I personally find it hard to believe, as solid and standardized his toque is there, that what he is doing evolved out of a music form established less than 20 years prior. Doesn't make sense to my inner being...but that is just me and it is just conjecture of course.
There is a great recording by the Centro Andaluz de Flamenco called "Cilindros de Cera. Primeras grabaciones de Flamenco." It's 2 CDs of remastered wax cylinder recordings from 1890 - 1905. The earliest of these would be some 20 years before the first Juan Gandulla recordings. The guitar on these recordings is pretty crude, especially compared to the cante which feels already highly developed. I don't think this proves that cante existed for a long time without the guitar, but it maybe shows that the guitar was not considered such a big deal back then.
See this is where I have to disagree. I went to search for what you describe and found this clip...no idea of the singer or guitar but it appears to be from the collection you describe as "crude" guitar....the only thing crude IMO is the fidelity, whch is understandable. The player has good compas and sensitivity to the cante, he is doing nice compas por tanguillo and some little arps between the thumb work.....nobody in the modern era would say if can play this way it is somehow ultra primitve toque. It is TRADITIONAL , orthodox...quite normal. This type of thing I learned for tanguillo when I was starting out. Sure it is not Nuñez but considering how flamenco is done in traditional circles, and hearing this as the EARLIEST recording of the genre, it just seems to me this way of playing was not super new by 1890's.
http://youtu.be/Iff0mQ01IXk
in regards to Kevin's post about reading ARCAS, I concur "both drinking from the same fountains" is more like it for me, than Arcas being such a heavy influence on the flamenco players in general. My point is you can claim it only one way or the other, so if some old flamenco guys had thier stuff together for a while already, why not that they actually could have influenced HIM instead?
Ricardo
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CD's and transcriptions available here:
www.ricardomarlow.com
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Date Mar. 25 2015 20:44:13
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BarkellWH
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
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RE: early history of rondeñas (in reply to Kevin)
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quote:
What is the difference? Why is the contrast of all that is noble in man with all that is common relevant to this thread? What possesses the "lowest common denominator" in this thread?
You miss the point entirely. There was a reference to Ortega y Gasset, who is a very interesting figure in Spanish history. I picked up on it to expand a bit on Ortega y Gasset's views, which were as I stated. It had nothing to do with this thread per se, nor was it a comment on any of the members contributing to the discussion on the early history of rondenas. It was simply to expand on an interesting individual in the Spain of the '30s.
That you have taken such umbrage at my comment and somehow have concluded that Ortega y Gasset's views on the noble and the common, as well as the lowest common denominator, refer to contributors to this thread reveals an extreme sensitivity on your part. I assure you that you are wrong. Nevertheless, your reaction suggests a high degree of insecurity and the possibility that in discussing Ortega y Gasset, an unintended target was hit.
Bill
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And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."
--Rudyard Kipling
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Date Mar. 25 2015 20:57:04
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aloysius
Posts: 233
Joined: Apr. 7 2005
From: Adelaide, Australia
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RE: early history of rondeñas (in reply to Ricardo)
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quote:
See this is where I have to disagree. I went to search for what you describe and found this clip...no idea of the singer or guitar but it appears to be from the collection you describe as "crude" guitar....the only thing crude IMO is the fidelity, whch is understandable. The player has good compas and sensitivity to the cante, he is doing nice compas por tanguillo and some little arps between the thumb work.....nobody in the modern era would say if can play this way it is somehow ultra primitve toque. It is TRADITIONAL , orthodox...quite normal. This type of thing I learned for tanguillo when I was starting out. Sure it is not Nuñez but considering how flamenco is done in traditional circles, and hearing this as the EARLIEST recording of the genre, it just seems to me this way of playing was not super new by 1890's.
Maybe 'crude' is a bad way to describe it - but it does sound to me like the guitar is trying to find its place, without a clear consensus on how to accompany. Here is a solea from that collection:
http://aloysiusleeson.com/Assets/Soleares.mp3
The accompanist here (Manuel López) uses a I - vi pattern in his comping, and a VI - III pattern for the macho of the verse, the other guitarists in the collection are different, one uses just I, II and III through the whole verse, another uses the VI chord in a different spot and so on. I agree the playing doesn't seem super new, just that there doesn't seem to be as much of a unified 'school' of playing then as there appears to be already in the cante.
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Date Mar. 26 2015 10:24:25
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Steelhead
Posts: 89
Joined: Nov. 20 2014
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RE: early history of rondeñas (in reply to Ricardo)
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My goodness, my original query certainly seems to have gotten ppl going. The articles by Rioja are excellent regarding Arcas, Murciano, and the evolution of proto-flamenco guitar in the mid-1800s. This recently unearthed score of Murciano would seem to represent an earlier style, since he died in 1848. BTW, it contains tremolo, illustrating that tremolo was established by then, and that proto-flamenco guitar playing was not just strumming and pulgar. There was clear interaction between unlettered guitarists like Murciano and classical professionals like Arcas. Meanwhile, there is no need to be ‘agnostic’ about the early history of flamenco, as Rioja, Steingress, Gamboa, and other Spanish scholars have unearthed a lot of information, including about its coalescence, by that name, around the 1860s. Many useful historical references have been found, not to mention the 1860s guitar scores of Arcas and now this earlier one. Scholars have also established that from the earliest period of ‘flamenco’ as a genre by that name, it was performed in public cafes cantantes, by professionals, for paying audiences, and it evolved in precisely that context, typically with guitar accompaniment. It is a myth that it was originally cante a palo seco, and guitar somehow came later. (Not to mention early 1600s references such as “La Gitanilla” by Cervantes to gypsy singers being accompanied by vihuela or whatever it was, I’ll have to check the reference.)
Actually, what I still don’t well understand is the relation of Ramon Montoya’s ‘rondeña’ to any extant earlier entity by that name. Unless someone persuades me otherwise, I am inclined to think that his “rondeña” had absolutely nothing in common with any earlier rondeñas.
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Steelhead
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Date Mar. 27 2015 21:13:26
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runner
Posts: 357
Joined: Dec. 5 2008
From: New Jersey USA
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RE: early history of rondeñas (in reply to Steelhead)
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quote:
I have long been a confirmed agnostic about any and all explanations of the origin of flamenco.
I am in full agreement that from the middle of the nineteenth century on, the early history of flamenco is being elucidated, and that the closer we get to the early recordings, the surer our knowledge becomes. My agnosticism is in reference to flamenco's alleged origins, pre-nineteenth century, in "Moorish" (Berber?), Arabic, Andalusian peasant, Sephardic, Indian, classical, operatic, ecclesiastical, or whatever else sort of music, or combinations thereof, that is anyone's particular hobbyhorse of the moment. Ditto for the Blues, as previously stated.
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The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.
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Date Mar. 28 2015 2:16:00
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Ricardo
Posts: 14806
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
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RE: early history of rondeñas (in reply to Steelhead)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Steelhead
My goodness, my original query certainly seems to have gotten ppl going. The articles by Rioja are excellent regarding Arcas, Murciano, and the evolution of proto-flamenco guitar in the mid-1800s. This recently unearthed score of Murciano would seem to represent an earlier style, since he died in 1848. BTW, it contains tremolo, illustrating that tremolo was established by then, and that proto-flamenco guitar playing was not just strumming and pulgar. There was clear interaction between unlettered guitarists like Murciano and classical professionals like Arcas. Meanwhile, there is no need to be ‘agnostic’ about the early history of flamenco, as Rioja, Steingress, Gamboa, and other Spanish scholars have unearthed a lot of information, including about its coalescence, by that name, around the 1860s. Many useful historical references have been found, not to mention the 1860s guitar scores of Arcas and now this earlier one. Scholars have also established that from the earliest period of ‘flamenco’ as a genre by that name, it was performed in public cafes cantantes, by professionals, for paying audiences, and it evolved in precisely that context, typically with guitar accompaniment. It is a myth that it was originally cante a palo seco, and guitar somehow came later. (Not to mention early 1600s references such as “La Gitanilla” by Cervantes to gypsy singers being accompanied by vihuela or whatever it was, I’ll have to check the reference.)
Actually, what I still don’t well understand is the relation of Ramon Montoya’s ‘rondeña’ to any extant earlier entity by that name. Unless someone persuades me otherwise, I am inclined to think that his “rondeña” had absolutely nothing in common with any earlier rondeñas.
interesting points regarding murciano...once again I restate CAN WE SEE THE (expletive) SCORE??????
proto flamenco not being so simple I want to agree with as I have stated earlier.
About Montoya...if that is what's buggng you we have discussed this in the past. I concur that so far evidence shows it to be uniquely his creation as a natural extension of exploring the new "levante" keys...he would use granaina tono and taranta tonos for many cantes we dont' use them for today...such as cartagenera, malagueñas, etc....and his rondeña as famously recorded uses a "levantica" type melody at one point....but why he CALLED it rondeña is anybody's guess. As discussed the tuning is not so unique as it's usage (low D very common and the F# from lute music..but LYDIAN explorations are very Indian IMO). Norman Kliman pointed out that Montoya used the tono and tuning to accompany cante but I can't recall what that was exactly. (EDIT: it was Taranta for a female singer).
pay attention to Norman's posts here:
http://www.foroflamenco.com/tm.asp?m=140827&appid=&p=&mpage=1&key=montoya%2Cronde%E3%B1a&tmode=&smode=&s=#140897
Ricardo
_____________________________
CD's and transcriptions available here:
www.ricardomarlow.com
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Date Mar. 28 2015 18:59:57
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Ricardo
Posts: 14806
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
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RE: early history of rondeñas (in reply to aloysius)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: aloysius
quote:
See this is where I have to disagree. I went to search for what you describe and found this clip...no idea of the singer or guitar but it appears to be from the collection you describe as "crude" guitar....the only thing crude IMO is the fidelity, whch is understandable. The player has good compas and sensitivity to the cante, he is doing nice compas por tanguillo and some little arps between the thumb work.....nobody in the modern era would say if can play this way it is somehow ultra primitve toque. It is TRADITIONAL , orthodox...quite normal. This type of thing I learned for tanguillo when I was starting out. Sure it is not Nuñez but considering how flamenco is done in traditional circles, and hearing this as the EARLIEST recording of the genre, it just seems to me this way of playing was not super new by 1890's.
Maybe 'crude' is a bad way to describe it - but it does sound to me like the guitar is trying to find its place, without a clear consensus on how to accompany. Here is a solea from that collection:
http://aloysiusleeson.com/Assets/Soleares.mp3
The accompanist here (Manuel López) uses a I - vi pattern in his comping, and a VI - III pattern for the macho of the verse, the other guitarists in the collection are different, one uses just I, II and III through the whole verse, another uses the VI chord in a different spot and so on. I agree the playing doesn't seem super new, just that there doesn't seem to be as much of a unified 'school' of playing then as there appears to be already in the cante.
Just noticed and reviewed this searching for something else...
Wow, very interesting recording...as per my opinion, just reinforced it big time. What I am hearing in this is several interesting things. First, the compas is steady and standard interms of strumming pattern. More like solea por buleria as we think of it today, but as discussed, that is normal for solea cante. The Dminor chord (iv you meant to write) is odd but not out of sorts, por medio often interchanges the Bb/D and the Dminor proper as implying the same harmonic movement ie substitutions. The other odd thing is the guitarist playing little "falsetas" or pulgar things under the cante, which is a little distracting vs the basic chords idea.
The VI-III (F-C7 barre) is the Standard reverse cambio we talked about in the cante accomp topic, where I note that M. MORAO and the like seem to have this standardized as the normal thing to do when playing por Medio (but not por Arriba). Hearing it done with regularity here makes it obvious that this was blue printed A LONG ASSS TIME AGO!!!!  The most interesting thing is the half compases done by the singer and how they are handled by the guitarist....the exact same as we discussed as done by N. Ricardo, Melchor, and Morao...you maintain 12's and put the cambio on the 1-2-3 part of the compas.
Fantastic example of how sht NEVER CHANGED and trying to pin this thing down is off the scope of what we can investigate concretely. I am left to conclude that the half compas rarities of Montoya and others (see norman's site for half compas buleria por solea examples), thought to have been abondoned in favor of the more "modern" approach of Melchor and Ricardo (who never broke 12's on recording), are in fact true anomolies and the idea of keeping 12's consciously is older than Montoya and friends.
_____________________________
CD's and transcriptions available here:
www.ricardomarlow.com
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Date Oct. 5 2015 13:58:50
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