After Flamenco is there Anything Else?

[BuleriaChk]

Just came across this on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSRrG...eature=related

[BuleriaChk]

FWIW, I just put all the Academy stuff I wrote in one big file you can download from my site...

Vamos ya! .

[Ned Milburn]

Originally Posted by Gostwriter

Have you ever found that after learning or starting to learn to play Flamenco nothing else seems quite as challenging or entertaining? Maybe the same can be said for Jazz players?

I mean there is so much new material to cover that the old 1-4-5 - folk, country, rock - just seems to bore me - not that I am an expert at the other stuff just that the challenge becomes so monumental that nothing else seems to be worth the time. Any thoughts?

My performance years ended shortly after beginning to foray into flamenco. The passion of the music is something that is hard to forget once you are smitten with it. And considering flamenco guitar was "written" on the guitar for the guitar, it fits well and naturally under the fingers. The great variety of techniques have been, until recent years, much more developed than many/most other styles. After all, they've been refining flamenco guitar playing for 200 years. (That said, of course, many modern fingerstyle players are incorporating a wide variety of techniques that are becoming well developed, too. But the tradition is certainly not as long standing in time and not nearly so codified.) After having spent a lot of effort playing Bach on the guitar, which is more like playing music in spite of the limitations and challenges of the guitar (because Bach was NOT written by a guitarist on the guitar for the guitar), learning flamenco was very refreshing.

I am glad I can participate in the living manifestation of the tradition by building flamenco guitars. Lord knows, my technique for flamenco is nowhere near being able to participate in the tradition as a player now.

[oldtimeblues]

Originally Posted by BuleriaChk

Uh, Greek Bouzouki, Indian Sitar, Japanese Koto.......

you got that right. I studied at the Ali Akbar School of music, and also did a stint in the oldtime fiddle crowd. Both of those schools have shaped my ability to find music outside of chord changes. Don't forget oldtime blues. It aint all 1-4-5.

The escape from harmony is usually the next step.

All the music is in the right hand, the left hand is just for notes.

[Cornell8]

I find it to be a tremendous resource and very helpful!
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[Paultergeist]

Originally Posted by BuleriaChk

Anyone can play anything they want, as far as I'm concerned. But words have meaning, and as long as the pick guys call it "Fusion" that's fine with me; just not "Flamenco Fusion". Flamenco has well defined rules steeped in tradition, and in particular oriented towards the acompaniment of power of the Cante Gitano, which is intimately related to the rasgueo, thumb/index, techniques.

I just think that straying far from this tradition and then using the word "Flamenco" to describe it is an insult to the pure artists, the tradition, the history. Kind of like playing accordion (no matter how well) a la Lawrence Welk and calling it "Blues Fusion" or "Polka Blues"...

Bottom Line: do what you will; I just consider it to be in extremely bad taste in any number of ways, no matter what the excuse....

Chuck,

It is obvious to me that you have great passion for this musical style, and I would not want to detract from that......but......I would be careful about embracing the *purist* concept too rigidly. I say this because there are some devotees of Flamenco who would argue that only someone of Spanish/Gypsy/Romanian blood -- who has lived a largely nomadic lifetime of struggle and oppression -- can truly be a "Flamenco" artist. Based on your name and website, you appear to me to be a white man living in an opulent region of Southern California. Based on those parameters alone, there are some extremists who would say that you could not truly understand nor convey the style.

I think it is hogwash, personally, and you seem to me to be a very competent Flamenco musician. I would maintain, however, that it is difficult if not impossible to defend the idea of what is/isn't part of a pure musical style, as virtually everything has evolved from something else along the way.

[BuleriaChk]

Originally Posted by Paultergeist

Chuck,

It is obvious to me that you have great passion for this musical style, and I would not want to detract from that......but......I would be careful about embracing the *purist* concept too rigidly. I say this because there are some devotees of Flamenco who would argue that only someone of Spanish/Gypsy/Romanian blood -- who has lived a largely nomadic lifetime of struggle and oppression -- can truly be a "Flamenco" artist. Based on your name and website, you appear to me to be a white man living in an opulent region of Southern California. Based on those parameters alone, there are some extremists who would say that you could not truly understand nor convey the style.

I think it is hogwash, personally, and you seem to me to be a very competent Flamenco musician. I would maintain, however, that it is difficult if not impossible to defend the idea of what is/isn't part of a pure musical style, as virtually everything has evolved from something else along the way.

Well, I may live in Santa Barbara, but I lived in a 48 Dodge Panel truck parked in the back of Stu's Chevron Service (I was his "night watchman") while working my way through UCSB. I am retired now, but the City of Santa Barbara has rented to me a very nice one bedroom apt. on Section 8, so you know what my income is.

I was in Physics Graduate School at UC Santa Barbara (UCSB - 1st semester in 1968) when a guitar student of mine said he was going to Spain....
Some background (see review of "The Indicted South" by Angie Maxwell):

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...ustomerReviews

When I went to Spain on my first trip I stayed in "La Soltea" (A gypsy section in Moron where they stay until they can move up. I do a fast walkthrough in one of my Moron videos (down the side street and up the stairs - the brief shot (very black closeup) is the bare room is where we lived, sleeping on the floor) right across the patio from Gonzalo and La Chica and their family (the other side of the patio). By the time I had the Super 8 on my last trip, Gonzalo et. al. had moved into the apartment above Bar Pepe (Diego del Gastor's old apartment, since he had passed on between my 3rd and 4th trip. La Chica was a cousin of Fernanda's, and is in the fiesta in the TV segment "Flamenco de la Frontera" (Fernanda, Paco del Gastor, et. al.)

http://www.flamencochuck.com/FlamencoJourney.html (Moron 04 01:26/02:38 ff.) (The apt. was Gonzalo's)

Moron at the time was a magical place in another time and space, but because I was obviously interested and Flamenco (and very, very poor), Diego and the Gitanos helped me enormously during that time (lots of war stories)....

I don't identify any more with "bleeding to death in the doorway of my mother's home", although I certainly did at one time coming in as an interested aficionado with a lot of existential angst; actually, neither did many of the gitanos in normal everyday life. Those that I knew were far from middle class, but the cante and toque grande came out rarely, and you had to be there (I was, on a couple of occasions, and it verified the value of Flamenco for me)

I don't claim to be anything other than trying to pass on the technical aspects of this fantastic art-form to the world at large (since Gitanos by and large don't understand the technical language of music), so that world will appreciate its true art in terms of its emphases in expression. (I do sing on occasion, and dance if plied with a bottle of fino, but that's another story.)

Bottom Line: I only claim to have had some experience with an expression of art in Moron (and Madrid in the Mercedes and Albano's studio and the studio at Calle Amor de Dios - where Antonio Gades discovered Carmen..) during the few times I went:

1. As a grad school dropout with only enough money to get there (long story how I got back)

Began writing course on return.... still living in my truck on tips from a small Mexican restaurant I was playing at on Sundays... (well, ok, it was in Montecito, but I was still in Isla Vista at Stu's) About 6 months in Moron... then traveled across Russia with what remained of my RA grant from UCSB, studied Karate in Japan for a month (tried to find work as an English teacher, but couldn't), worked my way back to San Francisco on a freighter returning from Vietnam (long story there.. , and finally slunk back to my truck in Santa Barbara....

1 year later:

2. Second trip same, except I worked with a company during the summer at nightclubs in
northern Spain (Fernando had been killed just before I got to Moron, and I spoke with Donn Pohren at the wake in Lebrija, who recommended I accept the job, since Moron was going to be mourning for the next extended period.

A couple of days in Moron, about 4 months in Madrid

1 year later:

Picked up the company (Batllet Iberia - Jose Lopez et. al. - and our little band alternated between El Prado in Sitges and Hotel Caltalan in Estartit. Studied accompany in studio of Mercedes Leon in Madrid (in winter, living in the broom closet of a pension, where I met Suzie who was studying Spanish at U. of Madrid.

2 years later

3. Wedding present from Suzie's family - one month in Spain. Spent the money for the last week on the Super 8 camera for the filme of Roberto Gales and Maria in Amor de Dios.
On return, Suzie studied them to learn dance.

2 years later

4. Trip on Canada Council Arts grant (see "Flamenco Journey" on my site) We auditioned for it at the National Ballet School in Toronto, by Susanna Unzueta.

That was it.. I did what I could. (Luckily while I was at UCSB I had a friend who was interested in Flamenco and purchased every album from Hispavox, and let me tape them on an old reel-tor-eel recorder (there were no cassettes yet). I scraped everything I could off those records, and the study - and a year I spent as music teacher at Loyola HS in Montreal thanks to Dr. Liz Haughey (Music Director at Concordia U.) and the good Jesuit fathers - I knew nothing of music theory at the time except guitar chords, and had to cram because the kids taking music were very bright. I knew nothing of Catholic mass, and was teaching them "Smoke on the Water" - but it was a fantastic education for me, and at the end of the year Suzie and I split for California again. The Jesuits were great people, and I'll always remember them for hiring me for the year, but at the end it was completely understandable that they wanted their 60 voice boys' choir back again...

(One of the reasons I wrote the course was that it was the result of my own research. The only other methods (that I knew about) at the time were Ivor Mairants and Medina's, a bunch of sheet music from Jose Azpiazu and a thoroughly wrong jazz musican's transcription of Flamenco Puro (Sabicas was using a capo on the third fret, and the guy fingered both the left and right hand (and the music) as if Sabicas was playing in open position. Since I didn't know about capos at that time, I had a hell of a time with those solos....

(Well, actually, there have been a few more adventures along the way....

Bottom Line: People who know the art know what is "pure" and what isn't. Offering a knowledgeable opinion is not necessary a defense, but an opinion based on agreement with a Flamenco community with experience and breadth in the field. I judge Flamenco primarily in terms of what turns me on, not necessarily what turns other people on... but then, I actually did experience some life with my Gitano friends...

[mr. beaumont]

I'm about 15 years into learning jazz, and I'm still learning new stuff...it is the end for me, or rather, the end I'll I'll never see. That's okay, though. The journey is the destination

Flamenco is a whole 'nuther world. It's freeform like jazz in places, it's structured and disciplined like classical in others. I have utmost respect for real flamencos...it's a pinnacle of the craft.

[Red_Label]

Originally Posted by Paultergeist

Chuck,

It is obvious to me that you have great passion for this musical style, and I would not want to detract from that......but......I would be careful about embracing the *purist* concept too rigidly. I say this because there are some devotees of Flamenco who would argue that only someone of Spanish/Gypsy/Romanian blood -- who has lived a largely nomadic lifetime of struggle and oppression -- can truly be a "Flamenco" artist. Based on your name and website, you appear to me to be a white man living in an opulent region of Southern California. Based on those parameters alone, there are some extremists who would say that you could not truly understand nor convey the style.

I think it is hogwash, personally, and you seem to me to be a very competent Flamenco musician. I would maintain, however, that it is difficult if not impossible to defend the idea of what is/isn't part of a pure musical style, as virtually everything has evolved from something else along the way.

No matter how "pure" one considers him/herself to be... there are always others who think of themselves as purer, and that everything outside of their own definition of the boundaries they've defined is watered-down mush. And then there are pioneers (like Paco) who don't really care to live their lives defined by what others think... only to be true to themselves. Hardline jazz purists, flamenco purists, classical purists, bluegrass purists, blues purists, etc... just different flavors of the same bag of popsicles. (Cue the "get off my lawn" pic of Clint Eastwood.)

Art that is true to its origins has a very important place in the education and edification of humanity. But then again, so does art that is just... art (regardless of the box in which someone other than the artist who created it, tries to stuff it).

[oldtimeblues]

Originally Posted by Red_Label

No matter how "pure" one considers him/herself to be... there are always others who think of themselves as purer, and that everything outside of their own definition of the boundaries they've defined is watered-down mush. And then there are pioneers (like Paco) who don't really care to live their lives defined by what others think... only to be true to themselves. Hardline jazz purists, flamenco purists, classical purists, bluegrass purists, blues purists, etc... just different flavors of the same bag of popsicles. (Cue the "get off my lawn" pic of Clint Eastwood.)

Art that is true to its origins has a very important place in the education and edification of humanity. But then again, so does art that is just... art (regardless of the box in which someone other than the artist who created it, tries to stuff it).

stick with what you know and understand and you will be ok no matter where or how you were born and raised.

[BuleriaChk]

The real test is whether the Gitanos will start singing or walk out of the bar when you start playing
(the art of Flamenco guitar seduction...)

(FWIW, Paco de Lucia was not Gitano - in fact his first "gypsy" Buleria I heard (other than the one on his '45) was on the album "El Duende de la Guitarra de Paco de Lucia", - after he performed with Paco del Gastor, who I can't help but think brought him back...)

e.g. "Fantasia Flamenca" was really, really dry, but still technically superb with some very interesting parts...

But I don't really know what happened.. see the photo of both Pacos in Bar Pepe in one of the Moron super 8's...

[Paultergeist]

Chuck,

Thank you for your thoughtful and detailed reply to my earlier post. You have certainly had some very interesting journeys driven by music, culture, guitar, and professional development / life in general. I enjoyed the reading.

All the best.

[oldtimeblues]

Originally Posted by Red_Label

No matter how "pure" one considers him/herself to be... there are always others who think of themselves as purer, and that everything outside of their own definition of the boundaries they've defined is watered-down mush. And then there are pioneers (like Paco) who don't really care to live their lives defined by what others think... only to be true to themselves. Hardline jazz purists, flamenco purists, classical purists, bluegrass purists, blues purists, etc... just different flavors of the same bag of popsicles. (Cue the "get off my lawn" pic of Clint Eastwood.)

Art that is true to its origins has a very important place in the education and edification of humanity. But then again, so does art that is just... art (regardless of the box in which someone other than the artist who created it, tries to stuff it).

nothing worse than listening to a Chinese person trying to play Bach. They're not even German are they?

[BuleriaChk]

Tina just sent me the URL for this documentary about Flamenco in Japan ("Tokyo Jondo; Flamenco in Japan"):

http://www.cultureunplugged.com/docu...line/play/5077
(about an hour)...

Profound insights about the relationships between the cultures of Spain and Japan, and how they intersect in Flamenco (both of which I have been intensely involved with throughout my life. Spanish TVE also has a number of programs on the Japanese fascination with Flamenco.

Very true to life and beautifully expressed (most of my time was with the Gitanos in Moron, but I did spend a fair amount in Madrid). And I really identify psychically with the Japanese artists in their efforts to come to terms with the art they love; as an American Flamenco...

[Timothy Lawler]

Originally Posted by BuleriaChk

Well, I may live in Santa Barbara, but... [snipped for brevity, but to anyone reading this stop right now and read his whole post]

That was a great read, Chuck. Many of the things you expressed apply broadly to all of us who perform, not just flamenco. I didn't grow up in JS Bach's world but I love playing his music. And I'm not even German. Crazy, I know.