Martín Guijarro

Looking inside but also with their sights set on the present time, some young flamencos are coming across other roads to make their musical work flow along. That is the case of ‘Son de la Frontera’ (Nuevos Medios, 2004), who with their first album manage to do what few can: surprise. The group's history is quite peculiar, since it is formed and quarreled over in the back room of the heterodox tonadillera Martirio with musicians who draw on the source of Morón de la Frontera and, more specifically, on the caño by Diego del Gastor. To flamenco guitar, baile, cante and rhythm, they add the Cuban tres, an instrument with which they moreover borrow from American music. It is therefore a work of diving and gliding; a round-trip job, understanding the description very broadly and positively.

Playing on the surname “de la frontera” (“from the border”), the music offered by the group sounds old and new, sounds like Morón but also ‘world music’ (a circuit where they can obviously make a place for themselves). And all of it based on the famous flourishes by Diego del Gastor for three basic styles: bulerías, soleá, tangos and seguiriyas. With this base, the five members of the group play to create a different sound, very rich in flamenco, but also very close to other sound traditions interconnected with the ‘jondo’, perhaps thanks to the metal strings of the tres. Not in vain does the zambra ‘Arabesco’ clearly refer to North African sound, providing yet another prism to the repertoire of these five ‘soneros’.

Upon bridging the gap between the two shores of the Atlantic, they've also dared to do research... and with irrefutable results. The group has discovered that the punto guajiro - created by the Andalusian peasants settling in Cuba - has the same rhythm structure as the bulería and, as Raúl Rodríguez - the tres player and musical director - says, “we've invented, just because, a new style: punto flamenco”. The discovery is captured in the song closing the album: ‘Bulería de las flores’. It will surely leave more than a few people gaping.

Something that also strongly attracts attention about this album is that it is recorded live at the studio, like it used to be done in the olden days but with current technology. And it therefore contains all the communication, all the dynamism and all the life. There is silence, tension and air. And all of it moves to a very close foreground, including the bailaor's feet - one more of the group's instruments -, the cheering, the clapping... and those “ghosts” who slip in at an instant. A real invitation to throw your passport overboard and fall in love with flamenco all over again, nearly too often so stricken with trite clichés.

More information:

Interview with Son de la Frontera (July 2004)