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What do you NOT like about flamenco?
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Ricardo
Posts: 15142
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
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 RE: What do you NOT like about flamenco? (in reply to Fawkes)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Fawkes
"Too many notes"
That makes me wonder this: for any given palo, what is the minimum number of notes per unit of time (measure, beat, whatever is most sensible) to successfully denote the palo?
Shouldn't playing simply but with correct compás be the focus for learning?
The guitar does not sustain, it is practically a percussion instrument. Ask a drummer to play “less notes” and see what happens to the rhythm. In that sense, the slower the tempo, the more notes are needed to keep the rhythm relevant. On electric guitar one can play and hold a single note for several measures. Rhythm is what it is. The lament of the OP is that in order to play the basics of flamenco guitar, a virtuosic ability is needed. The irony is when students develop rhythm skills, basic arpegio etc, to play basic compas and falsetas, they stop thinking of it as “virtuosic” and only things like “picado” are virtuoso skills, because all the rest is simply musical “feeling”. The irony is that is EXACTLY what virtuosic is. Doing fast movements and controlling the feeling and dynamics.
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Date Jan. 3 2023 12:06:32
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mark indigo
Posts: 3626
Joined: Dec. 5 2007
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RE: What do you NOT like about flamenco? (in reply to devilhand)
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quote:
I forgot to mention palmas. Palmas and drumming knuckles on a table are maybe the most annoying feature in flamenco. Imagine too many notes, legados etc. and palmas all together.
why not add the guitar, the rhythm, phrygian scale, the melodies, the chords, the singing and the dancing... 
EDIT: for anyone wondering, I was being HEAVILY sarcastic here... I actually really like palmas, nudillos, guitarra, compas, cante, baile y todo.
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Date Jan. 3 2023 18:00:15
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BarkellWH
Posts: 3464
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
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RE: What do you NOT like about flamenco? (in reply to devilhand)
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There is nothing I don't like about flamenco when we are talking actual flamenco. I like it all, although I'm less impressed with those who try to be cute and stretch the genre to include non-traditional instruments like a bass and a harmonica, which Paco in his later years attempted.
What I really dislike, though, are fraudsters like Rosalia who try and pawn off their "popster" music as "flamenco," when it is anything but. I equally dislike so-called "aficionados" (a few who have posted on the Foro) who aid and abet the fraudsters with lines such as (and here I am quoting): "We need new flamenco, urban flamenco, fusion flamenco, indie flamenco, dance flamenco, avant garde flamenco, experimental flamenco or whatever other labels they come up with."
That line, as you might have guessed, or even remembered, was in defense of Rosalia as a "flamenco artist," the likes of which, in the poster's opinion, "will keep flamenco alive." Better it die a natural death than be unrecognizably on life support as "urban flamenco," "fusion flamenco" or some other catchy moniker.
Lest any members think I am "trashing" Rosalia's art, and that of others claiming the mantle of flamenco when it is no such thing, I am not trashing her and the others for their art, which is in the "popster" realm. What I am criticizing is their claim to represent an art form they clearly do not represent. Even The New Yorker magazine was taken in, and they're a pretty sophisticated group. And I am afraid there are already some real flamencos who see some advantage in bending their art form in order to cash in on the zeitgeist.
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 Jan. 3 2023 18:13:52
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Bulerias2005
Posts: 635
Joined: Jul. 10 2010
From: Minneapolis, MN
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RE: What do you NOT like about flamenco? (in reply to devilhand)
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Purely personal preference, but I find that I'm not always in the mood for flamenco. Sometimes it's just too raw, too fundamental and intense in its emotion. It's most effective live, when you can be completely engrossed in the atmosphere. But just listening or practicing at home, particularly when cante is involved, it sometimes gets to be too much and I find myself going to music that's closer to my heart, like Brazilian jazz. This doesn't really have to do with cante being an "acquired taste" -- I like it just fine -- but I can only take so much of that degree of intensity at a time.
Agree 100% with chester as well regarding gatekeeping in the flamenco community, though thankfully that's not something I've encountered in a number of years now. I think if I run into it again, I'll check out much faster (and have a much more acerbic response) than I did when I was a teenager and didn't know any better than to let people with inferiority complexes push me around. It's a bit funny in retrospect, how insularity can foster this kind of stuff.
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Daniel Volovets
Jazz, Classical, Flamenco, & Latin-American Guitar
http://www.danielvolovets.com/
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Date Jan. 3 2023 19:07:56
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devilhand
Posts: 1674
Joined: Oct. 15 2019
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RE: What do you NOT like about flamenco? (in reply to mark indigo)
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quote:
why not add the guitar, the rhythm, phrygian scale, the melodies, the chords, the singing and the dancing...
Ole! That's a positive attitude.
quote:
What I really dislike, though, are fraudsters like Rosalia who try and pawn off their "popster" music as "flamenco,"
She seems to be successful in doing this. If a flamenco artist can be a sell out, she's definitely a sell-out.
quote:
The Andalusian cadence is particularly irritating. Flamenco could have been so much more without such restrictions. The reason we have to learn so much of this nasty superfast stuff is to add at least a modicum of interest to this musical prison.
I know what you mean. If you listen to flamenco, sooner or later Andalusian cadence will sound like the most overused riff on guitar.
As for the speed, I can feel you. Sometimes I think to myself what the hell I'm doing. Fast picado cannot be music. But next day I come back to it and want to tame this beast.
quote:
Purely personal preference, but I find that I'm not always in the mood for flamenco. Sometimes it's just too raw, too fundamental and intense in its emotion.
I can relate to that. Siguiriya is a good example. But to me other palos don't evoke such emotions. Up tempo palos like Alegrias can do the opposite even though I don't want to listen to this opening part tirititrantran again and again.
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Say No to Fuera de Compás!!!
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Date Jan. 4 2023 15:39:59
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