Correlates between Berber and Flamenco Rhythms

THE GYPSY LORE SOCIETY 2005 ANNUAL MEETING AND CONFERENCE ON GYPSY STUDIES , 2005

In order to understand Gypsies from a variety of perspectives I have carried out flamenco fieldwork in Granada, Gran Canaria (Spain) and ethnomusicology studies. In this paper I will suggest using oral, written and audiovisual sources to evaluate the comments of flamenco participants, to trace how the instruments are played and to understand how flamenco is performed. Many gypsies artists frequently cross their natural borders and take from folk and popular music, since like all of us they live in a globalized world. We must not assume, therefore, that they have been living in isolation. Since they have a complex and contested multi-cultural identity, it is not surprising that they have assimilated new sounds, forms and harmonies originating in different cultures. My experience of studying flamenco gypsies outside its "normative territory" of Southern Spain brings new perspectives (using other languages and sources) and I find new musical meanings assigned to this specific musical genre. These processes of recasting meanings from new theoretical perspectives alien to the flamenco tradition are as important from the outside as they are from within.

2003

Journal of The Society for The Anthropology of Europe, 2003

Recent studies on performance theory have turned their attention to the process of constructing social identities. This article proposes to examine the case of Gitano and non-Gitano relationships under this light. The field research in Jerez de la Frontera of Andalusia, has shown that 'objective' differences between the two groups seem to be minimal, although the members of the two groups recognize and present themselves as different. Relevant literature on Gitanos and their relationship to flamenco argues for a biological affinity of Gitano 'race' with flamenco singing and dancing. In a similar vein the indigenous discourse among Gitanos and among non-Gitanos justifies one group or the other as cultural owners and natural heirs of flamenco. Thus flamenco becomes a contested measure of social identity. This research attempts to reveal the power of the emic discourse on flamenco debate and to understand it under a constructivistic point of view. Based on the modern turn of Gypsy studies the present article re-examines the Gitanos/non-Gitanos relationship by focusing on the ways people negotiate their differences from the other group. Moreover, it attempts to observe and understand how these negotiated identities are performed on the social stage either on everyday life occasions or festivities.

Music and the Making of Portugal and Spain: Nationalism and Identity Politics in the Iberian Peninsula (Machin Authenrieth, M., Castelo-Branco, S. y Llano, S. eds.). Illinois: Illinois University Press, pp. 155-171., 2023

2020

This is a content-based course called Music in World Cultures. The course is meant to educate students on international music genres. This specific unit presents the flamenco dance. It is intended for adult learners of English with a B2 level on the CEFR scale. The goal of this unit is to inform students about the flamenco and to encourage them to think critically

Spain has been struggling with its own perception of 'The Gypsy' since their arrival in the peninsula many centuries ago. This essay looks into various literatures to try and understand and map the gypsy in Spanish Popular Culture.

2006

E ver ~illCL the miJ-nin i.:ri.:c nrh Ct'. ntury when Aamenco emerged as a puhlic enrerrainnkm genre, ir has meam d itfercnr rhing~ ro diffc: rcnr people:. Dc:-p~ndi11g 011 ,1ud ic: ncl'. anJ conrcxr, it has bec: n parry mu~ic for slumming An-ddlu~ian aristncrar~. an c:xor ic speccade for courists and outsiders, a private fiesta ,•nrcnainm enr f.>r gypsies, anJ, lase bur nor !t:asc, an arr form culrivared and d1e 1 i~hed hy ~eriou~ mu~ic-lover~. ToJay. as before, many pt'.ople enjoy-ar some kv..:1-thl'. "p,1~,ion'' and expn:~ĩviry or flamenco without und erstanding ir in tc: chnic al term~, o r even knowi ng how co rap rheir feet properly ro it. Althou gh chl'.r e ma~• be nn poinr in bditding rhi~ rarhc:r uninforrnc:d sorr of enjoymenr, rherc i~ also nu Jou hr that onc: 's apprc: ciation of Harnc: nco can aCl.1 uirc: an add ed Ji 1ne n, io11 111 • dl'. pth and richncs~ through und erstanding of some of its hasic t~,rm.d aspecc~. furrh crmorc:, with it~ formal complexiry, its idiosyncratic combi 11,nion of 1•. urnp ean and Middle Ea~cern-dc:rived fc:at ures, and it~ distinctive h.1mHmiL, rhvrhmi1.. , and. , cylĩtic conw nrion s, Hamenco otters parricular inter-e\c ro a rramn,nional stud y of such musical para.meters. T hi~ chap ter provides ,um e general backgrounJ data on flamenco style :ind ~rructure, and looks in deuil :ir a ,inrJe ~ung-form ,a iled ,oleares, and a repre~ema1ive performance of it. A.ldwugh H:in11. :nrn draws from tradition s many centuries old, it was not un1il rhc: tir~t half of the nin..:cc: enth ccnr ur y rhar it can be said to have emerged .1, ,1 distinLtive furm of Andalusian mu~ic. 1 Andalusian mu sic culture was irsdf I. . \n mn ,: clw lll,l!ly ho ok.,, explorin~ ,•,1rl y A.rn1cnco h ismr y arc L:fran c (2000), AJ-\ J1 0 (db.ilkn , (1 1)8 1). and Sdir rn1n (1985). FLAMENCO IN FOCUS Gypsy v 1itaris1 Diego dt:f GtJStor. />how by Jtl'/le K,1h11. an eclectic c: ntiry, syncretizing the legacy of the Arabs, Berhers, Jcws, Chri~ciam , and pagans who cohabitat ed for several centuries. Wh ile mo sr Jews and Moor s were expelled by che early r6oos, their mu siwi.l inHuence persisted , and the cthnic mix of purr towns like Seville and C:idiz was enriched by the: prc~ence of African slaves and inAuence~ from new form~ of creole Latin American music.

Ethno-musicology, 1989

For over a century flamenco has comprised the spontaneous music of the informal gy commercialized and adulterated fare performe musicians for non-gypsy audiences. Since the e vogue of flamenco, together with a set of bro rendered the flamenco complex even more host of innovative, eclectic, and popular sub traditional "pure" flamenco. While the flam cologia) that has mushroomed in the same of informative books, these have tended to puro rather than on the contemporary sta derivatives. A holistic perspective of modern flamenc styles-must comprehend the panoply of flame flourished in recent decades and now form culture; moreover,such a perspective must context of the social, economic, and politica Spanish society in the last half-century. Ideally, such a study should be the subject o until these have been undertaken, however, introductory attempt to contextualize the m styles in its sociocultural background. Thes flamenco, recent fusions of flamenco with andaluza (Andalusian "new song"), and the v popular musics which have emerged in recen *Research for this article, conducted in 1987, was par Council for Research in the Humanities and Social Scienc also due to my informants and teachers in Spain, and to their constructive comments.

This book, written in an accessible and open style, on the one hand offers English speakers an overview of flamenco as a musical form or set of musical practices, and, on the other, uses flamenco to interrogate some of the ways in which social bonds and ideas of ‘truth’ and ‘authenticity’ are played out by both flamenco musicians and lovers of flamenco in Southern Spain. The book is divided into six chapters (including the introductory chapter and a concluding chapter) and is based on research undertaken in Spanish archives and at flamenco performances at local peñas and tablaos on trips to Madrid, Seville, Granada and Málaga funded by the British Academy in 2013-2015. The book aims to be both introductory (in that it assumes no prior knowledge of flamenco, introducing and explaining terms and concepts carefully and systematically) and analytical (in both the music-analytical sense of the term and in the sense of ‘critical’, drawing, that is, on recent developments in the fields of affect theory, critiques of identity and identity politics and gender and sexuality studies). The book differs from much Spanish- and English-language scholarship on flamenco in that it: 1. Offers detailed and technical engagement with musical examples 2. Seeks to represent recent and classic Spanish-language scholarship to an English audience 3. Seeks to balance the demands of music-analytical approaches and cultural/contextual approaches 4. Seeks to give voice to ‘insider’ narratives about flamenco from within the flamenco-practising communities formed since the beginning of the twentieth century 5. Offers gender and sexuality-inflected analyses of flamenco largely missing from the scholarship to date 6. Discusses how flamenco practices and identities have been represented on film (in both narrative cinema and in documentaries) 7. Offers a detailed and critical discography of flamenco from 1901 through to the present

Journal of Jazz Studies, 2012