Marina Heredia, cantaora. ‘La voz
del agua’, track by track. Interview
“When I’m singing
I like to say something,
to leave a message”
Silvia Calado. Jerez, February 2007
Marina
Heredia hears ‘La voz del agua’ (‘The
Voice of Water’), the voice of Granada. “The
Arabs left us a lot of water there. There are wells, fountains
and streams everywhere... So it was a way for us to refer
to the sound coming out of the city. I’m from and
really attached to Granada and I wanted the album to be
really attached to Granada”. As she speaks, that
inspiring liquid becomes crystal-clear, though she’s
now in Jerez, just a few hours before her performance
at Bodega de Los Apóstoles, in the entrance hall
of a hotel like many other hotels, though outside the
sun is shining perfectly to capture her beauty... which
not only lies in her voice.
Marina Heredia (Photo: Daniel
Muñoz)
And this second album by the Granada-born
cantaora has its peculiarities... On the one hand, it’s
entirely self-produced and self-edited. “It’s
really a huge amount of work, but if it turns out well
for us, a record company won’t see hide nor hair
of me again, not even lured by gold coins”, the
artist explains, convinced. On the other hand, it didn’t
originate with the idea of being an album, but rather
it has been made, little by little, “by impulses”.
Marina relates that “it was recorded in Seville
and Jerez, and it had really been finished a couple of
years ago; it just needed to be mastered. When we finally
decided to bring it out, we remixed it again, included
the song ‘Illo y Romero’ and took off another
one which, with the paranoia you get over time, I didn’t
like anymore”.
She stresses that the main ingredient
of the record is “the affection the entire team
has put into it, because they’re all musicians who
usually come with me live”. And she stops and highlights
the role of each one of them. “There are two really
different guitars. That of José
Quevedo ‘Bola’ prevails because he’s
the producer and author of the music, but Luis Mariano
is also there, who’s the guitarist who plays tangos
de ‘Graná’ for me. They’re two
totally different guitars: one is old-time, vintage, that
Moorish sound from the school of Juan Habichuela; and
the other is that of Bola, who is contemporary, a super
musician. He has brilliant ideas, he’s very flamenco
playing... There’s been an explosive mixture”,
she comments.
...and company
She adds that Alexis Lefèvre also
goes with her. “When I hear his violin, it really
stands my hair on end. There’s one of the songs
which he begins while I’m off stage, and once I
stopped to listen to him and forgot that I had to come
back out”. Joining the band are “the clappers,
my Carlos Grilo and my Lúa, the new choruses that
I’d never had, but since we do twelve songs live
and I have I don’t know how many wardrobe changes,
I could end up needing to be put to bed. I need a little
breather”. There’s Fidel Cordero on piano,
“who’s amazing; with him, I do ‘A tu
vera’ and the cante de levante live”; and
Popo on contrabass, “though on the album Pablo
Martín played”. And she points out the
role of the percussionist, “my Paquito González,
who also co-produces; the three of us have been as one”.
Conclusion? “Well, we’re
taking a huge band live; the only thing that could happen
is that I screw up and get stoned by the crowd; it’s
not going to be because of them. The live show sounds
great because all the musicians are top-notch”.
In fact, the album is faithfully played on stage, something
infrequent in flamenco: “The main aim was to have
a record that could be taken live easily”. But it
has another aim as well. Marina Heredia is aware that
‘Me duele’ helped her “a great deal
for people to get to know me, but I don’t think
they got an entirely defined picture with that album.
Now I’m trying to define my image, my career, my
way and to begin the road I want to follow as a cantaora”.
Marina Heredia (Foto: Daniel
Muñoz)
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