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I'm kind of over solo guitar
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Richard Jernigan
Posts: 3430
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
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 RE: I'm kind of over solo guitar (in reply to Andy Culpepper)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Andy Culpepper
Damn, I am starting to sound like an old timer now 
Being a board-certified old timer, I don't mind saying that for me solo guitar has been a very minor fraction of flamenco listening for at least two decades.
Playing still gets the pulse rate up for me. Listening, not so much.
Baile--a ten-minute alegrias with footwork faster than a speeding bullet would put me to sleep if it weren't for all the damned noise. One exception was Paloma Fantova when she was here with Tomatito. She was utterly magnificent. They only let her do two numbers. I would have liked to see more, and something slow.
The most moving baile performance that sticks in memory for me was an exquisitely slow soleá in bata de cola by Carmen Amaya. But just to show she could still do it, she reappeared in pants, boots and bolero jacket to blow the roof off the Village Gate with a blazing bulerias.
I liked Antonio Gades, Laura del Sol and Cristina Hoyos in Saura's "Carmen", but it was a good story, and I saw it with my Japanese girlfriend whom I had recently fallen in love with. She liked it too, so we had a great time.
Paco was in "Carmen", but I don't remember much of what he played. I'm sure it was great.
Give me a good cantaor or cantaora and a good accompanist, and I'll be happy for at least a couple of hours.
RNJ
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Mar. 19 2016 18:47:37
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El Frijolito
Posts: 131
Joined: Feb. 27 2016
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RE: I'm kind of over solo guitar (in reply to Leñador)
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I suspect the issues of pacing and programming are and have been at the forefront of considerations of gigging guitarists, particularly headliners. Two hours or so of full-throttle fuego tends to be rather unmemorable - it works better in small doses throughout the set, coupled with dynamics and tempo contrasts, and highlighting other performers as well.
Flamenco faces a challenge in that its traditional context doesn't necessarily translate well to other types of venues, and the audience for cante is smaller - partly for aesthetic reasons and partly for the language barrier. This makes pacing and programming more challenging.
In the jazz genre, Wes Montgomery seems to have thought about pacing and programming - as a leader he had to throw in some dramatic soloing, but his small groups necessarily shared spotlight time with other instrumentalists (expectations of the genre). Beyond that, he took advantage of a wide range of repertoire (standards, blues, ballads, originals) and would typically play a solo chord-melody - all with widely varying tempos, feels, and moods. He had the capacity to burn for chorus after chorus, but usually held this in check. A story I've heard recently has him turning down an invitation to play with Coltrane because he couldn't see the point of playing the same tune for an hour.
I also reflect on seeing Allan Holdsworth a few years back, in a bar filled to capacity and overflowing into the parking lot. Even Allan, who is (perhaps reluctantly) a barn-burner extraordinaire, does a bit in his sets where the rhythm section sits out and he plays a slow-paced chordal composition that's rather different from the pyrotechnics of his other tunes, and with a rather different sound palette. Also, he tries to vary his compositions in terms of the string sets and voicing structures each employs.
Anyway, just some thoughts on how guitar headliners in another genre seem to have addressed the issues of pacing and variety.
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Date Mar. 19 2016 18:51:41
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estebanana
Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
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RE: I'm kind of over solo guitar (in reply to Andy Culpepper)
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quote:
Personally I just don't care for theater flamenco shows. Not sure exactly why but it would never interest me to go see any of my flamenco guitar icons in a theater setting. I would much prefer to watch some no-name player accompany some impromptu cante in a bar in Sevilla.
There is something about flamenco where I just need to be within 15 feet of the artists. So you can hear the real acoustic sound of the guitar and how it interacts with the voice. You can watch their technique up close and see the perspiration on the fingerboard when they change positions. You feel the vibrations of the actual instrument, not speakers that are 100 feet away.
I agree, but 15 feet out is 5 feet too far.
One of the great things about having lived in Oakland and Berkeley is that during the 90's and 2000's many very fine artists passed through town on tour or staying in town teaching and I went to the big shows about half of the time. I usually view big theatre shows as a the beginning part of the night that interests me the least. Going to the show means you have seen it at least, but the real good stuff happens when the artists have had dinner and still feel like they want to make flamenco.
The most satisfying shows are the ones with two cante' solos in each half, or better yet, cante' baile, guitar cante' cante' cante' baile, fin. Or some such order. The Bay Area aficionados really have a taste for stage shows with that much cante and will fill a 300 -400 seat house for a show like that. Bigger venues that require more general public buying tickets and not just flamenco specialist audiences are more difficult to schedule with that much singing. Flamenco people in the Bay Area will even organize shows themselves and make a potaje and each pay 80.00 to 120.00 dollars to hire a small room and pay an artist do a show for 30-40 people. Those kinds of performances are more true flamenco than most big stage shows that have to sell out to the general public. or a 200 seat room and charge 30 or 40 .A gathering like that can go on for 6 hours, or a day if you count the carrying on after the artists performed for the allotted time. A 25 minute bulerias with two singers and two dancers would be a regular thing.
The general public does not get that kind of show and guitar solo shows are easier to sell to a 3000 seat house so a market has developed for it. It is also cheaper for a guitar show because good singers and dancers are expensive and guitarists side men, from a promoters budget view point are not. Guitar show are easier to tour because it is usually a few guys and not a lot of dancers and palmas people to flesh out a proper big show, and dragging trunks of costumes. Noche Flamenca is a more difficult and expensive show to tour than Vicente and they fill the same venue and have to pay out a different number of artists. Airfare for a big company is expensive, the tour is just more hassle and much more risk financially.
For me solo guitar in the 3000 seat auditorium is NOT flamenco , don't get me wrong I am moved by the guitar, but these solo guitar shows are a invention of a market niche that caters to general audiences that don't really have a taste or desire to see flamenco in depth. It disturbs me a bit that this market niche has come to be seen as flamenco and that a there is a notion about that guitar divorced from cante is being called flamenco of its own, but my viewpoint is probably not going to be the majority view in the future. Solo guitar shows will continue to be another obstacle one has to mount in order to see back room, kitchen, back porch flamenco. But they should go on right, I mean who does not love a guitar solo? Just not 45 minutes of Rondena.
That probably seems like a neo Stalinist attitude about flamenco, but some one has to put down the rebellion.
That said I'll probably listen to some solo guitar today, because what is flamenco? Nothing if not being able to hold two opposing view points at the same time.
_____________________________
https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Mar. 19 2016 20:55:55
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