Listener's guide. Flamenco and world music. Special feature

Listener's guide. Flamenco and world music

Flamenco and other deep-rooted musical forms

Martín Guijarro, March 2006

One of the musical categories opening most doors for flamenco music in recent years is that of ‘world music’. Flamenco itself is evidently a global form of music, with a rich tradition and deep-seated roots... as are gnawa, Andalusí, Indian, Bulgarian choral and Cuban music. And the aim of this guide is to offer the flamenco-lover some pointers in terms of the catalog of (currently available) joint ventures where flamenco meets other like genres. In most cases there is a rediscovery of some kind of common genetic heritage, as it's widely known that flamenco is a blend of styles. In the rest, they're simply aiming to enrich their sound with other musical ingredients from the far corners of the globe. Here begins a journey around the world with flamenco as your chaperone.

The journey begins close to home, only fifteen kilometers away in fact... in Africa. In the wake of pioneering projects such as ‘Macama jonda’ by José Heredia Maya, El Lebrijano would appear to provide one of the most solid and best-known encounters between flamenco and North African music. ‘Encuentros’ (1988) put flamenco vocals and guitar in contact with traditional Andalusí sounds performed by the Tangier Andalusí Orchestra. This project's success was backed up almost a decade later with ‘Casablanca’, an album with new songs on which the vocalist from Lebrija is accompanied by the Andalusian Arabian Orchestra. And in 2005, Juan Peña wrote a further chapter in the history of these encounters, side-by-side with a solo performer - violinist Faiçal Kourrich. Together they came up with ‘Puertas abiertas’. The same path as ‘Macama jonda’ and El Lebrijano's encounters was trodden in live projects such as ‘Cuscús flamenco’ with the voices of Arcángel and Segundo Falcón, the guitars of Paco Jarana and Miguel Ochando, and Jallal Chekkara heading up the Andalusí orchestra. This still hasn't emerged in the shape of a recording though.

The group Ketama ventured a little further south. Back in 1988 they turned their attention on Mali, organizing a fruitful encounter with Toumani Diabate. The kora and the voice of the African blend with the modern-day flamenco advocated by the descendents of the Habichuela and Sordera clans. The work was immortalized on two volumes of ‘Songhai’, an album that was voted best foreign album of the year by ‘New Musical Express’ magazine.

The emergence of new sounds in Northern Africa hasn't gone unnoticed in flamenco. The raï movement, spearheaded by Algerian Khaled, left its legacy on albums such as Vicente Amigo's ‘Ciudad de las ideas’ and the soundtrack from the documentary ‘Morente sueña La Alhambra’, scheduled for release in 2006.

Don't forget to listen to Lole Montoya singing the song ‘Sangre gitana y mora’ in Arabic on the legendary album ‘Nuevo día’ (1975). The Seville-born cantaora has this legacy running in her veins as her mother, La Negra, was born in Oman. And together mother and daughter wallow in those origins on ‘Tercera generación’ from the album ‘Ni el oro ni la plata’, as well as on the track ‘Bintijamila’ where they're accompanied by an Arabian quartet consisting of canun, violin, tambourine and darbuka.

So much has been dreamed about Ziryab... The Blackbird, as he was known, was a Persian court musician in the Umayyad Caliphate who introduced Indian music to Spain, accounting for flamenco's ties with Indian styles. And the odd title from the modern flamenco catalog provides a good illustration of this link. The most essential of these is the album ‘Yerbagüena’ by Pepe Habichuela. The Granada-born guitarist went into the recording studio alongside The Bollywood Strings, and the result was a project where the analogies between the two musical traditions are as evident as is the skill of the musicians involved.

Although it isn't a complete project, in amongst the ten tracks of his debut album ‘Un segundo de cante’, Segundo Falcón slips in a track recorded with a band of musicians from Rajasthan: ‘Al compás de sombra’. The vocalist from Seville takes primitive cantes based on the trilla and tonás livianas over into his guest artists' territory, with spectacular results. The relationship took on renewed strength as part of a show called ‘Tierra de nadie’, premièred at the 2004 Festival Bienal de Sevilla. A similar experience saw Miguel Poveda and Duquende on the flamenco side and Faiz Ali on the sufi side, in what came to be called ‘Qawwali jondo’, which was not to be released on any album.

Poland was the scene of another meeting of minds between flamenco and Indian artists: the album ‘Indialucía’. The project, led by guitarist Miguel Czachowski, brings flamenco-style guitar face-to-face with Indian elements such as sitar, tabla and voice. And it isn't unusual to find details, joint ventures, and the odd whiff of Indian music, such as the track ‘Todo tiende’ from the Ojos de Brujo album ‘Techarí’, simply evidence of multiculturalism and global culture. Although in reality flamenco's love affair with all things Indian in began in the sixties via the Beatles and Andalusian rock. Gualberto was the one who added sitar details on albums by Smash, on joint ventures with Ricardo Miño and even on Camarón's legendary ‘La leyenda del tiempo’.