Music of Andalucía The Music of Andalucía is fundamentally western and has itself had a strong influence on western music generally but it has also been influenced by diverse non-western influences, most notably Romani, Moorish and Sephardic Jewish. Andalucía was probably the main route of transmission of a number of near-eastern musical instruments used in classical music such as the rebec (ancestor of the violin) from the rebab, the guitar from qitara and naker from naqareh. Further terms fell into disuse in Europe including adufe from al-duff, alboka from al-buq, anafil from al-nafir, exabeba from al-shabbaba (flute), atabal (bass drum) from al-tabl, atambal from al-tinbal, the balaban and sonajas de azófar from sunuj al-sufr. There was also the conical bore wind instruments, the xelami from the sulami or fistula (flute or musical pipe), the shawm and dulzaina from the reed instruments zamr and al-zurna, the gaita from the rhaita, rackett from iraqya or iraqiyya, geige (German for the violin) from ghichak and the theorbo from the tarab. According to historic sources, William VIII, the Duke of Aquitaine and Count of Poitiers and the father of William IX, who was the Duke of Aquitaine and Gascony brought to Poitiers hundreds of Muslim prisoners and trend acknowledges that the troubadours derived their sense of form and the subject matter of their poetry from Andalucía. The hypothesis that the troubadour tradition was created, more or less, by William VIII (who died in 1086) after his experience of Moorish arts while fighting with the Reconquista in Spain was also championed by Ramón Menéndez Pidal in the early 20th century. And not, as it had been thought going back to the Cinquecento and Giammaria Barbieri (who died in 1575) and Juan Andrés (who died in 1822). Meg Bogin, an English translator of the female troubadours, also held this hypothesis. Certainly a body of song of comparable intensity, profanity and eroticism (existed) in Arabic from the second half of the 9th century onwards. Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, edited Andalucía is a modern autonomous community of Spain that is best known for flamenco, a form of music and dance that is mostly performed by Andalucian people. Improvised flamenco songs of ancient Andalucian origin are called cante jondo, and are characterised by a reduced tonal ambiance, a strict rhythm, baroque ornamentation and repetition of notes. Cante jondo is sung by a single singer (cantaor). There are two forms of flamenco songs: cante jondo and cante chico. Cante jondo are slower and usually feature sad lyrics about disappointed love or death, while cante chico are much quicker, more popular and dance-oriented. The concept of duende is very important in flamenco. Loosely, defined, duende is a spiritual or emotional bond between the performer and audience, created by the performers intense concentration and passion. The guitar is a vital instrument to flamenco; it marks the measure of a song, and is frequently used in expressive solos during which the guitarist will improvise short variations called falsetas. Ramón Montoya was the most influential early guitarist, known for having solidified the guitar as a solo instrument. His successors included Manolo Sanlúcar and Paco de Lucía. The golden age of flamenco is said to be between 1869 and 1910, later becoming more and more popularised internationally and influenced by South American music, especially the tango. Musicians from the golden age performed at bars called café cantantes, such as Café de Chinitas in the city of Málaga, which was made famous by the poetry of Federico García Lorca. Other musicians of the early 20th century include Manolo Caracol, who walked from the city of Jerez de la Frontera to participate in a cante jondo competition, which he then won. Though the golden age had long since passed, the 1950’s saw flamenco achieving increased respectability in Spain. Hispavox, a Spanish record label, released Antología del Cante Flamenco in 1956; the recordings collection of most all of the greatest flamenco singers was very popular. In 1956, the first national cante jondo competition was held in the city of Cordoba, followed by a Chair of Flamencology being established in the city Jerez de la Frontera in 1958. In the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, Antonio Mairena and similar artists helped kickstart a flamenco revival as American and British rock began dominating the Spanish music scene. Emerging from this, Camarón de la Isla became one of the most popular and critically acclaimed performers of the century. His 1969 debut Con la Colaboracion Especial de Paco de Lucia inspired a new generation of performers that invented what would be called Nuevo Flamenco. In the 1970’s and 1980’s, salsa, blues, rumba and other influences were added to flamenco, along with music from Morocco and India. Ketamas 1988 debut, Ketama, was especially influential. At the beginning of the 1990’s, the Madrid record label Nuevos Medios became closely associated with the new flamenco fusion music, which then came to be called Nuevo Flamenco.
Posted on: Thu, 04 Sep 2014 09:16:08 +0000
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