Diego Carrasco: The art of insinuation

Diego Carrasco surprises us, as usual, with a new recording after seven years of silence, titled "Inquilino del mundo" (tenant of the world). This peculiar musician has devoted fans, and on stage his magnetism emits sparks a compás. His is a mix of rhythms and musicians, a "travilitrán" that emits the joy of the alegrías de Cádiz over a tango or zambra, or whatever he points his guitar at, drawing circumferences with his right leg, and imagining the rhythm.

"For me, Juan Talega and those guys were too much. They had a very old style and would mark ancestral rhythms. Time is right there. If this has anything at all it's a singular form of expression."

"Rapsoda (a kind of ancient bard). I love that word. You have it with ice, and it must be delicious."

Touching tracings

Diego is still the master of the sly wink, treasuring with simplicity what is complicated, and in possession of the secret to the bulería: that spiral-shaped mantra, the hypnotic clap that gives purpose to the fiesta, the onomatopoetic rhythm of quejíos through the guitar. He doesn't call it compás or rhythm.

"I'm very proud of the sense of time that God has given me."

"That's how I see it: time. Then there are transformations or limitations, because when you turn it into math, it's limited. They give it names, like three-four, or four-nine, but I think that all of that has nothing to do with flamenco. Nobody can say that soleá is just three-four time. And siguiriyas? The question isn't the rhythm, but the sense of time. What am I supposed to do? To try to enjoy it. How? It's a gift. Maybe you're in the past, like you're in the present or the future, and you're combining them."

Different rhythms

"They lived all of this first-hand... They'd be in a forge, one of them with the hammer, the other working the metal, and the other... All of them with different rhythms and different ways of singing. When you hear a martinete in a theater, and you see one of them with a hammer, singing to himself, it has nothing to do with what would happen in a forge, with the bellows creating a rhythm, the hammer another, and so on. And I think that the same thing must happen in the country. And if you're at sea, the air gets inside you and makes you sing a certain way."

Affection is very nice

Diego includes José Mercé, Vicente Soto, El Torta, and El Capullo in his generation… "But those are the greats. It must be really hard for them because they're qualified to sing, but nowadays there's another sound and another way of singing, but they conserve what they've got, and they're amazing."

"Now there's a group of kids that blows me away. The kids that are playing today are incredible. You go to hear a group, and when you pick up your drink they've changed instruments. And by your third drink, you ask how many different groups have performed. I'm glad to see that kids really know what they're doing."

"We all come from the same root. Some make it more modern, some more urban... The form of expression is different, but working musicians are all offshoots of the same root."

The junkman on my street

Diego puts "Latero" (junkman), that rusty old pregón, to soleá. In his live presentation in Madrid, he was accompanied by the dancing of La Tati and Joaquín Cortés.

"That 'Latero' came about when we were all sitting around on that sofa, with Manolito Soler and Moraíto. It's fresh, like we are, and it's a pleasure to share it with people, and that there's understanding and harmony. Yeah, 'El Latero' was really nice. I'd spent two days working on something else, and I was kind of sensitive that day. I remembered a gitano from Jerez called El Remache; his singing is anarchic and he expresses himself in a very personal way. So that transformed me, and I thought that we didn't have to do a serious soleá. The singing is serious, but in a very simple and natural way; even more so in my style. We started to get it down, with Soler dancing and Morao playing, and before we knew it, there it was. Bola and Tino were there, too. I love that mysterious air that it has. It'll be interesting to hear what the purists have to say."

Natural therapy

"Nothing was premeditated, it all came out naturally. There wasn't any studying for any of the tracks. If anything, they came about because I was saturated with working on other people's stuff. Or from commenting on things. Like saying to Jesús Bola 'Have you read this poem by Neruda?' Let's see... sit down at the piano to read it, and on the first try, it came out just like I felt it."

Searching for perfection

"Look, for me, one of flamenco's strongest points, what makes it great compared to other kinds of music, is that it's always different. The freshness and improvisation in flamenco. That's what I've experienced. I've listened to Terremoto and Tío Borrico, I've played for them, and for Tía Anica, and they always sang the same verse differently. That's lost in a studio. Or even on a stage, when things are strictly organized. That makes things monotonous; a search for perfection. But I place a lot of importance on that improvisation, that freshness, and then you look for a form afterwards: Jorge Pardo comes along and says, 'Hey, give me some of that.'"

Anarcotemporal

"Today things are like never before; there are even things being done with classical music. For me, Juan Talega and those guys were too much. They had a very old style and would mark ancestral rhythms. They'd start at the beginning, the middle, the end. Time is right there. If this has anything at all, it's a singular form of expression. Those people knew so much, and they'd start and finish wherever they wanted to, and they'd always be in perfect compás."

The mission

"It's a joy to be together for such a long time, and to be able to say, 'Let's make a recording for 2000.' What's it going to be this time? That's clear enough. I forget about past projects and look for the freshness of being able to be in other countries. What's my mission? Sincerely, I think about that, too. That's what I feel. This rhythm and feeling is what's driven my family. And if it's called flamenco, that's fine. For me it's great that musicians from other countries listen to this kind of bulería. It really is a kind of mission: there's got to be someone who breaks down barriers and obstacles. We're like a team in this movement, and there are a lot of us creating this kind of flamenco."

The guitar

"The guitar is my arm; my weapon. What I like is contrast, like a bulería with clapping, guitar, and something else. And it's still a bulería. Maybe for other musicians this is more familiar. That's the mission I'm referring to: To a certain extent, it could be like someone who hooks people into getting deeper into the art. Flamenco isn't just about old ways, but about being alive and acknowledging it. We see it and we feel it; we're living and feeling."
"It's like chess, where each piece has a mission. Some work a certain way, and some of us work in another. This is my way. I'm a joker; I like laughing, rhythm, seeing people dance... And when you use your head, either from your own tenacity, or what you were born with, when you see that reciprocity, it's such a sweet feeling. What I like the most is to get together with great musicians, because they make the music even greater. That's the most beautiful of all: to be a partner of musicians."

"At home everyone tells me: 'But you sing so bad...' I don't even listen to that, so that's why I laugh at some of the specialized critics."

Luis Clemente
Traslation: Norman Paul Kliman