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Now I’m not on a slippery slope here - well I hope not. Back Jan 1st 2019 I made a new year’s resolution “To play a minimum of 1 hour flamenco guitar everyday for 500 days”. I was starting from 1st base.
I’d tried back in 2003. I’d never played an instrument before and had the rhythm of a donkey. I made a little progress but when you haven’t had time to practise between lessons what’s the point. I crept along and then like many fell be the wayside.
Well the last 500 days went well. I missed 35 days: 20 days due to tennis elbow (don’t over do stretchy chords), and 15 days travelling “sin guitarra”. But my playing is now beyond launch pad. There is no going back.
However, during the last 100 days of my project the virus hit. And that led to me playing rock/pop/classic 60/70/80/90s stuff (mainly strumming) with a group of about 8 people online. It is more about singing than playing but I found it really useful. Chord changes improved, timing improved, and most importantly for me the nerves when playing in front of people got better (still wouldn’t play in the pub but chance would be a fine thing).
So now I’m thinking of getting an acoustic. Obviously the right hand might need beefing up but if I use a pick the left hand should be ok. But wondered what the thoughts were of people who maybe came from a different genre, or who have maybe added a genre after Flamenco. So far my gitano prof in Jerez almost had a heart attack when I mentioned it. And Ricardo’s thoughts on duets (not positive) made me wonder.
One advantage is that my family appreciate my Bob Dylan, Green Day, Whitesnake, …….. more than my Fandangos and Alegrias. After all they can join in, while I take my flamenco seriously so subject them to a great deal of repetition.
Any thoughts before I turn into a rock star very welcome.
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nigel (el raton de Watford - now Puerto de Santa Maria, Cadiz)
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
Nigel,
In my early twenties I decided to take Clasical playing seriously. At our local junior collage the were classes taught by a well know pro player who headed the music department at the our state university. I also took a few quarters of music theory.
At home I practiced two hours a day. I had my corner in the house with my chair, my foot stool, music stand, metronome.
At some point I realized the time i spent playing had become contentious to my wife. At some point toward the end I realized as soon as I started playing she would decide it was time to become amorous. I know, I know, tough problem to have.
I finely gave in and decided to put everything in my playing corner away... There were other life issues of course, part of growing up and the work a day world sucking one dry. There was our child who I had no regrets devoting my time toward. I ended up with a job that required hours of commuting each day.
Of course we were divorced a few years later...
I can't tell you how much I regretted making that decision to place my guitar into her case to collect dust under our bed. I tried more then a few times to regain the fire and dedication I had when I started, but no joy.
About twenty years ago I found a perfect guitar and only a few years later she burned up in a fire. Over the years I looked and looked for her sonic equal but again no joy.
Less then two years ago I had the brilliant idea: I'll just make one!
It was then while perusing luthier building forums that I discovered what I wanted to play from the vary beginning wasn't classical but Flamenco.
I had built my first guitar in two weeks and at first sat down to relearn the two simple pieces I had know almost thirty years ago. My partner had asked my to learn a piece she had know in her youth, I found the score, a common Bach ( Boss corrected me , it was Vivaldi ) lute piece transcribed for guitar but had already found the Foro and was diving into years of fascinating threads and falling in love with Paco and Paco and Cante all the while not finding inspiration to learn the Bach piece, not even for love it seems.
I want to play Flamenco.
I'm a realist, I'll never really play flamenco Puro, my mind and fingers have been roughly used, but I can noodle around and find great joy in scratching out a few simple first position cords in a,reasonable form of compas: my flamingo. I doubt I will ever stop playing. Last week my partner said she had to stop what she was doing because what I was playing sounded really good. About a year ago she had complained about me playing the same cords over and over again. I made it vary clear that I could go down to the bar and get drunk instead, that I would never again give up my guitar for anyone, my playing, the challenge and the joy man funds in making music.
Olé!
HR
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I prefer my flamenco guitar spicy, doesn't have to be fast, should have some meat on the bones, can be raw or well done, as long as it doesn't sound like it's turning green on an elevator floor.
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to Paul Magnussen)
quote:
If they have anything, it’s escaped me. Am I wrong, or are all the songs but a couple in the same key, tempo and same time signature?
I presume they must have something. What am I missing?
The American rock band Green Day has released 13 studio albums, three live albums, five compilation albums, one soundtrack album, four video albums, 11 extended plays, four box sets, 43 singles, 10 promotional singles and 47 music videos. The band has sold over 85 million records worldwide, including more than 24 million in the United States alone
Everyone to their own
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nigel (el raton de Watford - now Puerto de Santa Maria, Cadiz)
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
quote:
Maybe no one plays acoustic and flamenco But I fancy giving it a go.
I think you should get an acoustic. It’s all music, so it’s all good, and your family likes it, too. Plus, nothing is stopping you from continuing with Flamenco. It’s not like playing the acoustic will result in banishment from the Foro or anything. They let anyone hang out here...
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to RobF)
quote:
It’s not like playing the acoustic will result in banishment from the Foro or anything. They let anyone hang out here...
Rob I'm definitely not giving up flamenco. I've invested to much. And I haven't touched Bulerias or Rumba yet.
I just wondered if others had found with two genres that one of the two got dropped after a while. Or if the different fret board size might be a drawback. For example yesterday the acoustic guys were using the left-hand thumb to block or fret the 6th string . Obviously there is much in common and one option is just to play the acoustic stuff on my Alhambra (he can take high tension and doesn't mind a bashing )
Great thing is plenty of acoustics at under 100 Euros.
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nigel (el raton de Watford - now Puerto de Santa Maria, Cadiz)
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to mark indigo)
quote:
why do you need one? why not just play whatever you want on your flamenco guitar? use rasgueado instead of strumming with a plectrum.
Mark that works but at times I need that acoustic sound and when I play with 6 others, all acoustic, it does sound odd. But as I said to Rob I might try my Alhambra with HT.
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nigel (el raton de Watford - now Puerto de Santa Maria, Cadiz)
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
quote:
But as I said to Rob I might try my Alhambra with HT.
Every household needs at least one acoustic guitar kicking around...
OK, you’re in Spain, so modify that to a Spanish guitar. But you’re also British. That’s got to count for something. You can’t be sitting around the plaza singing “SunShanSupaNaovah” with a Spanish guitar, for cripe’s sake! It’s simply not cricket.
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to RobF)
quote:
Every household needs at least one acoustic guitar kicking around...
Rob you need to speak with my wife. She thinks 3 flamencas is enough .
By the way I'd be doing "Boulevard of broken Dreams" and "Times like these" (Foo version) We haven't done “SunShanSupaNaovah” and I won't be suggesting it
But to be honest the Plaza is safe from my attempts.
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nigel (el raton de Watford - now Puerto de Santa Maria, Cadiz)
Posts: 14797
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
Just get a plug in flamenco cordoba so you can do both. If you just want steel string sound, well, they have cheap enough pedals that you can plug into an though the amp that mimic the sound of other guitars....even distorted electric. Al Dimeola does exactly this with his Conde, although he is using more expensive samples and midi,, the idea is the same. He plays a conde hits a pedal switch mid song and he as a distorted les Paul sound.
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
I vote for getting an acoustic. I don’t play mine much except for a little flat picking one in a while. Recently I had one of those Line6 multi effects pedals and plugged my Blanca into it. Lot of fun.
I find myself moving around from one dead genre of music to the next, following the inspiration.
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
I have a steel-string and play it fairly regularly, mostly just as accompaniment for singing folk songs and the like. I guess you just need to be careful that it doesn't bleed into your flamenco playing and mess up your technique.
Lately I've been considering picking up another language just for fun. I was a little bit concerned about learning another language while I feel I still have a good ways to go with Spanish (I do alright and I can cover all the conversations I need to get by and live here, but I've been sitting on my laurels these last 2 years and haven't made the kind of progress I could/should have made). I chanced upon some videos of some polyglot conference held a few years back and binged through them. A lot of them speak an absurd amount of languages, in the double digits, with some being remarkably proficient.
I did think to myself that none of them were as proficient as someone who focused on a single language. But here we're talking about the 0.0001% at the top. Earlier this year I mentioned author Akira Mizubayashi, who to me is one of the few foreigners I've ever heard who learned French as an adult yet is, to my ears at least, indistinguishable from a native speaker. None of these polyglots were at his level. They were very good in French, very good in fact, but I could tell they weren't native speakers. So perhaps one question is just what level do you want to achieve in flamenco. If you just want to be conversant, or fluent, you may have room for something else. If you want to be in that 0.0001%, you may not have room for something else.
Me, I'm all over the place in that regard. I play all the instruments I have at home regularly. These days it's especially the piano and recorder. Though in terms of time spent on these instruments, it's quite clear where my priorities are: flamenco guitar.
Several of the speakers at this conference talked about strategies for learning new languages. Most of them either said that you should only learn one at a time, and only start another language once you'd reach a strong degree of proficiency in whatever language you were learning before, or that you should give priority to one over the other (for instance, spending 80% of your time studying one, and only 20% the other). To me that makes sense. If you get an acoustic and just play it every other day, once a week or whatever, and keep up your regular practice of flamenco, I wouldn't see it as a problem. But if you go down some rabbit hole to the point where you're playing the steel-string about as much as flamenco, then yeah, then you're on that dangerous slope.
So yeah, I'd say 1. depends on your goals, and 2. depends on how much of your flamenco practice is eaten up by time spent on the steel-string.
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"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to RobF)
quote:
Every household needs at least one acoustic guitar kicking around...
nope, nasty twangy metallic things with impossible narrow banjo necks...
what really annoys me is that these bastard-love-child-of-a-guitar-and-a-banjo so-called "guitar" things have a monopoly on the word "acoustic" - my flamenco guitars are all acoustic, but they are spanish nylon strung acoustics, not american steel strung acoustics.
i had an awful conversation with someone last year who asked my if my guitar was a "normal" guitar, and when i asked what they thought a "normal" guitar was they said "like the beatles played"
EDIT: sorry, forgot some of these things in this post: so added just now...
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
Thanks guys for the thoughts. On an electric approach I'll avoid that one. Never had much success, too many problems moving around, and I end up playing electronics and not playing guitar.
A secondhand one at 75Euros is no big deal and I can always sell it on if it doesn't suit my fingers. Doing Hotel California today and it sure sounds better on an acoustic steel string.
But all this might just be until the lockdown ends so I might return to pure 100% flamenco by 2025
Rock on
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nigel (el raton de Watford - now Puerto de Santa Maria, Cadiz)
Posts: 6415
Joined: Jul. 6 2003
From: England, living in Italy
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
Electric guitar is pointless without a full band behind you. Steel acoustic guitar is great for aimless strumming, with so much sustain and harmonics. Or you could try a 12-string (meh)
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to Escribano)
quote:
Electric guitar is pointless without a full band behind you. Steel acoustic guitar is great for aimless strumming, with so much sustain and harmonics. Or you could try a 12-string (meh)
Simon that was electronics as in amps, pedals, synth, etc. as opposed to electric guitar.
I do know that there are many people that have an acoustic and go in for "aimless strumming" and really enjoy it. But at the other end of the scale is god (EC)
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nigel (el raton de Watford - now Puerto de Santa Maria, Cadiz)
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
Forgive me father for I have sinned...
I have a 1970 Corona made Strat. I would keep it in the hanger and when everyone had gone home I would plug her into the little practice amp, turn both the volume and gain up to 11, then crush cords that would vibrate spray foam off the walls and bird nests out of the rafters.
A few years before I had a fire burn up all my instruments and one day a pilot friend of mine mentioned selling a couple guitars, he had made a go at becoming a rock star but instead he got hooked on another kind of rock and was crushed by it. He was working in xxxx when huricain Ketrina came through, his band put all their instruments on the third floor, and left town.
When my budy showed me the guitar all the chrome work had a tinge of green from reacting with the briny storm water and the frets were slightly worn. K said his friend in town would replace the frets and polish up the bright work. God No! I wanted her as she was my well aged slightly green huriacan guitar.
Sadly she is at my neglected home hundreds of miles away, left there almost five years ago leaning against the wall, when after courting my lady friend for a few years I traded in my world for Hers...
HR
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I prefer my flamenco guitar spicy, doesn't have to be fast, should have some meat on the bones, can be raw or well done, as long as it doesn't sound like it's turning green on an elevator floor.
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to Escribano)
quote:
Perchè no?
It's definitely on the list if I go for a European language.
_____________________________
"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
I am (/was until recently) always a rock guy first and foremost, I played a couple of decades (on/off) of steel string acoustic and electric before I tried flamenco.
What I would say for pop/rock/country/whatever you play on a steel string acoustic - is you get results quicker. It is easier and quicker to get to a point where you can play something you know completely, which is a real important motivator.
If I had started learning rock guitar the same time I started flamenco and put the same hours in, I would probably have a repertoire of real songs which I knew from my record collection and which others would recognise when I played.Flamenco on the other hand, I have a couple of short practice pieces which only exist in the context of a student's book, and a load of short phrases and practice exercises.
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to Inglés)
quote:
Flamenco on the other hand, I have a couple of short practice pieces which only exist in the context of a student's book, and a load of short phrases and practice exercises.
I think this is a problem outside of spain, where we tend to approach flamenco in a very academic way with books and exercises. I think in spain it is much more organic, beginning with basic rhythm and accompanying "a repertoire of real songs which I knew from my record collection and which others would recognise when I played."
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to mark indigo)
quote:
ORIGINAL: mark indigo
I think this is a problem outside of spain, where we tend to approach flamenco in a very academic way with books and exercises. I think in spain it is much more organic, beginning with basic rhythm and accompanying "a repertoire of real songs which I knew from my record collection and which others would recognise when I played."
You might well be right, I'm largely self-taught so I don't have much option but to work from a book that I can tell.
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to Inglés)
quote:
I would probably have a repertoire of real songs which I knew from my record collection
Yes and I of course can play with others. I've tried finding flamenco players interested in just meeting up and playing, without success. But acoustic/vocal groups no problem.
On the learning outside Spain for sure my guy in Jerez instantly recognises 'guiri' flamenco materials. And for sure the approach here is much more lots of compas with what I'd call compas falsetas if you know what I mean.
Still makes me smile when my man in Jerez just scribbles me a bit of tab on a small bit of paper with a pencil. (It isn't that he doesn't have a hundred books). He then takes a photo and sends it to me. Modern world meets old world
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nigel (el raton de Watford - now Puerto de Santa Maria, Cadiz)
Posts: 3430
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
quote:
ORIGINAL: flyeogh On the learning outside Spain for sure my guy in Jerez instantly recognises 'guiri' flamenco materials.
What are some 'guiri' flamenco materials? I'm having a hard time figuring out what they would be. Just ignorance on my part, I suppose. Help me out, please.
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to Richard Jernigan)
quote:
What are some 'guiri' flamenco materials? I'm having a hard time figuring out what they would be. Just ignorance on my part, I suppose. Help me out, please.
Richard sad to say IMHO (as I quite like Juan) the extreme examples are Juan Martin’s El Arte and Solos flamencos.
My man Moises, (who I should say is a professional music teacher working at two institutions, as well as being an authentic gitano) considered the Sevillanas on Page 66, lesson 10, of El Arte to be really ‘guiri’. “You’d never find a gitano playing that” he said.
Having looked at it a bit I note many teaching books rush you through palo after palo – adding one or two new techniques every page. One compass, three falsetas, NEXT – as in Juan’s El Arte. Where as the materials of Paco Costa (aimed at Spaniards), for example, for Fandangos offers 19 sections: Introduction, palmas, Use of foot, 6 different compass sections, followed by 10 remates. Only then is falseta mentioned. It seems like for the ‘guiri’ it is necessary to make each thing a song and get quick results. And I remember being there before I retired
I joined an online asesoria last night with Paco and about 15 learners. He spent some time on Bulerias accompaniment to cante. I don’t play Bulerias or accompany cante but it was still useful. The message was soak it in, feel it, interact with it. Listen (we used
) as something to work with and play to.
Be patient was a big message as always.
And thinking of your question Richard I thought maybe that is a ‘guri’ difference. Guiris are in general in a rush and thus materials aimed at them are designed to meet that need/desire to get quick results. Seems most Gitanos learn over years.
Hope that makes some sense.
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nigel (el raton de Watford - now Puerto de Santa Maria, Cadiz)
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to Inglés)
quote:
You might well be right, I'm largely self-taught so I don't have much option but to work from a book that I can tell.
You can use DVD, and/or online resources; both are better for seeing and hearing techniques. I posted some stuff in another thread yesterday, I will post it again here:
If possible avoid books. You need, as far as possible, to develop your ear and learn by ear and use your memory. Flamenco artists do not write or publish scores, and transcriptions are made by other people and often wrong. If you cannot have face to face lessons locally, consider skype. And/or video lessons. I used to recommend Oscar Herrero's Paso a Paso videos, but there are now streaming lessons.
One tip is to try to get close to the source, by which I mean you don't necessarily have to have someone spanish or from spain, but someone who plays or has played with singers and/or dancers, so check out their work and their credentials.
These videos of Salvador Andrades are in Spanish, but you can use the auto translate, and if you go to Algeciras or get him on Skype he has good English. He grew up in Paco de Lucia's hometown, had lessons from Paco's father and accompanied Camarón among other accomplishments:
Posts: 3430
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
RE: Dangerous slope away from flamnc... (in reply to flyeogh)
quote:
ORIGINAL: flyeogh
quote:
What are some 'guiri' flamenco materials? I'm having a hard time figuring out what they would be. Just ignorance on my part, I suppose. Help me out, please.
Richard sad to say IMHO (as I quite like Juan) the extreme examples are Juan Martin’s El Arte and Solos flamencos.
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But I fancy giving it a go. I'm playing three hours a day on average so I think I can squeeze both in. 
. Obviously there is much in common and one option is just to play the acoustic stuff on my Alhambra (he can take high tension and doesn't mind a bashing 
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