FLAMENCO GUITAR. VICENTE AMIGO. ‘UN MOMENTO EN EL SONIDO’. TEATRO MOVISTAR, MADRID

The kind guitar

S.C. Madrid, November 14th, 2005

‘Un momento en el sonido’. Vicente Amigo: guitar. José Manuel Hierro: second guitar. Blas Córdoba: cante. Patricio Cámara: percussion and voice. Paquito González: percussions. José María Cortina: keyboards. Antonio Ramos ‘Maca’: electric bass. Teatro Movistar. Madrid (Spain), November 14th, 2005. 9 p.m.

	Vicente Amigo (Photo: Daniel Muñoz)

Japan, France, Mexico, Finland... and finally, Spain. Vicente Amigo pulls into town with a long trail behind him to present to the Madrid audience his latest album ‘Un momento en el sonido’, just a few days after doing the same in Barcelona. The place chosen in the Spanish capital was the Teatro Movistar, in a break from the musical occupying the program at this venue for the past several months. And, judging by the sell-out crowd, the concert – promoted by the Agencia Andaluza para el Desarrollo del Flamenco (Andalusian Agency for Flamenco Development) (?) - it was long-awaited.

The musician made his appearance alone with his guitar. He freely sketched the first chords. Reflective, free, sweet. He gave way, with invisible seams, to the soleá ‘Mezquita’. Music in search of beauty, which comes from behind... and wants to move forward. Along the way it bumps into the compás of the clapping by the group, about to join in for the fandangos. Together, they sing “el mensaje que traen las palomas”, letting Blas Córdoba's torn quejío emerge. At this point, the guitarist has already made his intentions clear: “I hope you carry away bit of my heart... as if you carry it all away”.

The tocaor devotes himself entirely, with a sweet, fluent sound cajoling with ease. Electric bass, keyboard, percussions... are combined in a kind new-age tone to undertake the journey towards the bulería ‘Campo de la verdad’. He continues the performance in the land of rhythmic flamenco with ‘Tangos del Arco Bajo’. But compared to the recording, the band's live arrangement waters down the piece, a tone which will be kept up more than what is desirable throughout the concert.

The farruca returns interest to the sonanta. ‘Silia y el tiempo’ is a composition of searching and growth, a transit requiring effort on behalf of the listener... which is nearly to be thanked more than ‘pre-digested’ flamenco. The guitarist is left alone once more. He changes his sound once again to withdraw, like at the beginning, and to caress the taranta which lends its name to the album, the fifth of his career. The minimum and calm. He requires the group's company for the melancholy stylized bulería ‘Rocamador’... more stylized than bulería. And the thing is that there's something missing in the attack, the feeling, the flamencura.

The rumba ‘Demipatí’ manages to warm up the ambience, just when the ‘romanticism’ returns with ‘Bolero a Marcos’, a song dedicated to bullfighters Finito de Córdoba and José Tomás, “who have helped me to move on, since I look at myself in the mirror of what they do although it doesn't have anything to do with it”. He cranks the song out despite a spotlight popping, and for a few moments, the theater was left with the sound of monitors. The end of the concert is announced with ‘Oriente mediterráneo’. First, the joke: “You deserve... for us to leave already and go have some beers”. Afterwards, the affectionate afterthought: “I've tried to run myself dry; we'll recharge our batteries later on”. The piece confirms his devotion. Lovely is the running of the guitar, the tension, the complicity. The audience is more than pleased, but not yet satisfied. The ovation is answered with an encore which puts the finishing touch on the staging of the new repertoire of music by one of the artists occupying the podium of honor of today's flamenco.

magazine@flamenco-world.com