2003 FLAMENCO PA'TOS FESTIVAL

Laughing and Crying

Silvia Calado Olivo. Madrid, June 23rd, 2003
Photos: Daniel Muñoz
Translation: Joseph Kopec

Rafael Riqueni. Diego Carrasco. Javier Barón. Chirigota de Las Niñas. College of Doctors. Madrid, June 23rd, 2003. 9 p.m.

Rafael Riqueni

"Flamenco has a somewhat queer color and that thing with the bent stance... but it has its advantages", by Juan Luis Cano. "Flamenco is a very difficult art because it's very limited... if you pole vault, you're no good", by Guillermo Fesser. Every year, you have to wait for Flamenco Pa'tos for the sense of humor to come out of flamenco behind the scenes. And it does so, as if that weren't enough, accompanied by high-quality bills, in the setting of the beautiful amphitheater of Madrid's College of Doctors with the aim of financing the charity projects of the Gomaespuma Foundation. In this fourth edition, given that the Spanish radio duo responsible for inventing the organization is no longer on the airwaves, the novelty is that the crowd "has to cough up", but paying twelve euros is well worth it in exchange for the three-fold program.

A one-person version of Chirigota Las Niñas -"imagine how we're doing, budget-wise"- launched the festival. And she did so with a chirigota-style romance entitled 'La emigranta gaditana', a rhymed tour which led the reciter to make a vindication against the Law on Aliens: "Let's be more understanding with those who come to Spain". This said (and applauded), flamenco took command. Rafael Riqueni is back, following a long period of absence. Gomaespuma explained it their way: "He's been away from the stage due to health problems... he'd lost three fingers and was no longer the same". The fact is that he was there ready to delight the audience "with songs by maestros who came before us and set up the way for us to build the present and future of flamenco guitar". The Sevillian guitarist began with a soleá and 'Danza árabe' by Sabicas, attacking forcefully, describing with delicacy, virtuous and sensitive, flowing, giving away beauty. He did some alegrías by Niño Ricardo in A, making all six strings sing, with their rests, with their brushes...; and 'Recuerdo a Sevilla', a song with tearful passages, with evocative passages, with passages of palpable plastic art. He bade farewell with Esteban de Sanlúcar, a guitarist who, as he explained, "emigrated to America and left important works such as 'Mantilla de feria', which Paco de Lucía ended up recording on his first records, and who brought Argentinean influences to flamenco". He chose the aforementioned song and a zapateado from his repertoire, both with play, a certain naïve simplicity and a pronounced preciosity as their features. And that was how Rafael Riqueni explained to the gaping crowd the today of the sonanta by means of its yesterday, offering them the sole opportunity to relive compositions only possessed by mechanical players.

"What a huge pleasure to have listened to our brother Riqueni on the guitar". With these words Diego Carrasco (El Tate) took over in the center of the ring. Tate came in grasping his guitar, with tears in his throat: "My friend Manuel Soler has left us and I would like to dedicate this tune to him". That song entitled 'El Cachorro me dijo' which, as a sort of saeta, tells how the Sevillian Christ of the Expiration has just gasped his last breath of life. The Jerez-born guitarist, cantaor and composer reinvented this particular requiem with hair-raising sincerity. That might be why he tried to turn over a new leaf and connect it with a bulería, because Manuel Soler used to make all of us laugh, that one he sang recently in 'Dime', that one about the lettuce, fair and parsley lover. "I just can't forget you!". Showing his usual naturalness and having alluded to the fatigue he was experiencing -"yesterday I picked up the guitar and now I have blisters..."-, he called out his neighboring guitarist Juan Diego. "And now what?". And it was no joke... everything was being improvised. The assisting guitar aimed the alegrías of the "black-light crystals" at him and Diego Carrasco answered him with a roar on a sweet background, toying with the rhythm, with the lyrics that travel around Andalusian lands. "I've never sung better in all my life than today", he tells himself. And taking advantage of the occasion, he gets back in through soleá, with low notes. He reinvents 'Latero', putting in the string of the opening, decking it out with those cuts and those phrases whose ends are left to be finished up in the air. "Do a flourish or something; we have half an hour to do". But he doesn't let him; immediately "today isn't bulería day" springs up, and nearly breathlessly, 'Mi momá'. The truth is chewed over. Olé to Juan Diego for having the wisdom of continuing, on top of it with delicacy, the hazardous art of Diego Carrasco's guts and gray matter. And olé to him.

Javier Barón

Javier Barón also dedicated his performance to Manuel Soler. And he gave him a single dance, but executed with the intensity of five. Soleá through bulerías, jaleos extremeños, bulerías. The Sevillian bailaor danced powerfully, without losing an ounce of intensity from beginning to end. And he was furiously technical and fluently esthetic and precisely musical. He enjoyed himself and he made the crowd enjoy themselves... Before the end of the show with his group (with guitarist Javier Patino and cantaor José Anillo, among others), he already had a smile on his face. And it rubbed off on those present, since both flamenco which cries and that which laughs is for he who produces it and for he who receives it; it's pa'tos (for everyone).

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