One of my loves is traditional cante flamenco, usually a singer and a guitarist sitting closely together, perhaps a small coterie of friends and relations together around a table, able to offer encouragement, rhythmic clapping, palmas, as seems best, and to express their appreciation of particularly moving expression on the part of the singer. The idea is to convey emotion, or the simulacrum of emotion, from singer to the small world immediately around her or him. The guitarist, or tocaor, provides a constant sympathetic and complementary accompaniment to the cantaor/cantaora, often looking closely into the singer's face to ensure that the rapport is tightly maintained-- it's a remarkable pairing. The guitarists, who are seemingly numberless throughout flamenco Spain, are almost stupefyingly skilled at the technical aspects of guitar play, yet this amazing virtuosity is, in the best accompanists, kept in tight check to better "romance the stone" of the singer's utterances. The singers themselves most often do not have, and are not judged upon, the quality of their voices--by the standards of Western art song or popular song, their voices, and appearances, are rough, "untrained", ragged--but rather upon their knowledge of the various forms or palos of flamenco, their mastery of many of them, and their ability to move their audience to empathy and/or admiration.
Sung flamenco, authentic cante, is an acquired taste. When I would play my flamenco albums in my room, my mother would ask when the chicken-strangling would be over. Yet the stories that revolve around the greatest singers of yesteryear--people like Manuel Torres, for example-- tell of people rending their clothing, crying uncontrollably, actually leaping through windows, while under the spell of his singing (such behavior often fueled by alcohol, to be sure). Anyway, what draws me into this world of cante flamenco is this experience of raw emotion, or often also of exquisite performance of the classical palos by both singer and guitarist, even in those cases where the emotional component is subdued, and the goal is to render a piece in a more detached manner. I just love it, and have since about the age of 15.
I have relocated this post here from another part of the Forum (some will recognize having seen it before), as it serves reasonably well as an introduction to why I have long cherished traditional cante flamenco, and it will serve as an excuse for me to post some observations about flamenco and some examples of flamenco song, and to welcome others to comment as they choose. More to come, as time and circumstances permit.
Sung flamenco, authentic cante, is an acquired taste. When I would play my flamenco albums in my room, my mother would ask when the chicken-strangling would be over. Yet the stories that revolve around the greatest singers of yesteryear--people like Manuel Torres, for example-- tell of people rending their clothing, crying uncontrollably, actually leaping through windows, while under the spell of his singing (such behavior often fueled by alcohol, to be sure). Anyway, what draws me into this world of cante flamenco is this experience of raw emotion, or often also of exquisite performance of the classical palos by both singer and guitarist, even in those cases where the emotional component is subdued, and the goal is to render a piece in a more detached manner. I just love it, and have since about the age of 15.
I have relocated this post here from another part of the Forum (some will recognize having seen it before), as it serves reasonably well as an introduction to why I have long cherished traditional cante flamenco, and it will serve as an excuse for me to post some observations about flamenco and some examples of flamenco song, and to welcome others to comment as they choose. More to come, as time and circumstances permit.