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Have you discovered any cantes
or cantaores that have caught your eye in particular?
They all have their certain something.
El
Mellizo and El Malagueño have their something,
Juan
Varea also has a lovely malagueña I have a
recording of. Every cantaor has something important. There
are some cantaores I don’t like at all... and I
don’t learn anything from them. I don’t want
to give any names. I don’t learn anything there
even if I’m tied up. One thing is to know a lot
and another is to perform. And I’m not saying I
don’t like them, but that they’re bad. And
when I say it, I can prove it.
Diego Clavel (Photo Daniel
Muñoz)
And anyone you have as a guiding
light?
Well then, the cantaores from there in
Seville... For example, por soleá, tientos and
seguiriyas, Antonio Mairena. But, for example, I can’t
learn from him in cantes like the malagueña; he
fell short there. Nor por alegrías, because Mairena
just sings por cantiñas and por alegrías
he just has a couple of sets of lyrics recorded; he used
to go right away to the cantiña. I have a lot of
guiding lights. To me, La
Niña de los Peines was the best of all. She
was a real monster; she really used to sing everything
well. Better than Mairena and better than anyone. She
was complete.
You thus settle the controversy
with Mairena...
Well, he did a taranto out of obligation.
It wasn’t his forte. To me, his forte was por romance,
soleá, seguiriya, toná, martinete... But
other cantes weren’t to be learned from him. Other
cantaores did them better.
Can you give us the scoop on
your next project?
We’re going to work on the seguiriya,
each of whose styles has its creators and place of origin.
Where I haven’t managed to do that entirely is in
the cantes de Levante. There’s a huge mess. No matter
how much I would ask, I’d never get a straight answer.
I give an explanation on the album and I add old lyrics
as a reference and a short explanation on why I haven’t
been able to catalogue it like in the soleá, Huelva
and the malagueña.
And you do your own lyrics...
Diego Clavel (Photo
Daniel Muñoz) |
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Yeah, I’ve been writing my own
lyrics for like ten or twelve years now. When I get a
cante and I want to learn it, as I go along listening
to it, I stick in my lyrics. Once I’ve gotten to
know the cante, when I’ve already learned it, I
then know it with my lyrics. And it’s not that I
do a ton of lyrics. No, I do one set, maybe I touch it
up a bit, but I do one set of lyrics per cante. I don’t
do lyrics to keep them. I don’t do ten or twelve
sets to see which one I like most. I don’t have
that capacity, either. I’m always inspired by folk
lyrics and by the tone there is in each cante. If I do
lyrics por alegrías I don’t say that my mother’s
died, but rather I speak about fishermen, little boats,
sea stuff. They’re going to say that on this album
I just talk about mines and miners, but it’s clear
that the entire record is about cantes mineros. What am
I going to talk about? You have to give cantes and lyrics
their purpose.
Is it hard to create in cante?
For example, I’ve just done three
malagueñas as my own creation. And they’re
a creation because they aren’t like any other and
they aren’t based on others. If not, I wouldn’t
be so shameless as to say they’re mine. The caracoles
I recorded, as well. What I do is first learn the roots
and once I know the roots, if I can, I stick something
in. I was really bold with the fandangos by El
Gloria; I also stuck something in, I dared to. I also
added something to the mariana by Bernardo
el de los Lobitos. There are a few cantes I’ve
added stuff of my own to. Creations per se, the three
malagueñas.
After there being so many different types
of music done, you have to do one that doesn’t seem
like any other. And I’ve done it without being a
musician or anything, but all my life I’ve had a
really good ear. I’ve always gone down the street
whistling cuplés. Since I was a little boy, I’ve
done the voice and accompaniment by whistling. For example,
I was in a bugle band in my hometown and I was the one
who used to play the drum. I did my military service and
I was the one who’d play the drum. I’ve always
had music under my skin.
Would you like for the anthologies
to be of use to young cantaores?
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| "If
this were going to be lost, as old as flamenco is,
it would’ve already been lost. Flamenco is
never going to be lost" |
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Well, the thing is that if in order to
record what I’ve recorded, I had to go to old recordings
which were very hard to find and often had really bad
sound quality, and I’ve done a worthy job of it,
and now it’s clean, they have to come in search
of that. In order to record, I’ve had to seek a
lot, to ask a lot of questions. I remember one who sent
me a couple of malagueñas from Jerez. And now they’re
all together. The convenience they’re going to have
now... It’s exciting for me, but I think for them,
it’s an obligation to learn. And it might just as
well be of use to someone who wants to be professional
as to an enthusiast. I’ve done work for the flamenco
world. And I can be trusted. I think my work is trustworthy;
it’s halfway decent.
How do you size up the new generation?
It seems like this way of ours is being
lost a little bit, of people like me; I’m now sixty
years old and five months. I don’t see that road
for the new people, especially those who excel. They want
to do other things... though each does what he feels.
In any case, if this were going to be lost, as old as
flamenco is, it would’ve already been lost. Flamenco
is never going to be lost.
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