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HISTORY OF FLAMENCO (P 1) |
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| Musical antecedents |
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In a fast exercise of imagination we could we transferred until Arab Spain, because the modulations and melismas that they define to the flamenco sort can come from the Islamic songs monocordes. It also has who attributes the creation of this music to the gypsys, a town coming from India - until it does relatively little was thought that Egyptian and they were desperdigado, by his condition of nomadic, by all Europe. Spain they entered at the beginning of century xv, looking for climates warmer than those than until then had found in the continent. The different musical legacies cannot either be forgotten that they left the Andalusian relatives in the south of Spain, where had had use melodías salmodiales and the Jewish musical system, the ways jónico and frigio inspired by the bizantino song, the old Hindu musical systems, the Muslim songs and the folksongs mozárabes, from where probably they come jarchas and zambras.
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Without entering value judgments on what theory has more force - others exist but with less acceptance, which pilfers can assure is that the flamenco one is born of the own town, has an evident root folkloric, but when happening through the sieve of the throats of precise creators it has become an unquestionable art. |
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| First written references |
According to the spread ideas more, in the principles there was dance nor no guitar, only sings, so that it has been gotten to think that the first wood of history was toná, and that this one was based in the triangle formed by Triana, Jerez and Cadiz.
Nevertheless, after a deep reading of the work the Gitanilla, of Cervantes, can be observed that, unless the famous writer were counted a history fruit of his imagination, the first flamenco discipline was the dance, as ratifies the personage of Precious, a young bailaora that gained the life doing cut dances Andalusian to whom they subjugated so much the musical support as the vowel, both connected to make the gypsy in excess calls.
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At the beginning of this cervantina exemplary novel it is possible to be read: “The only dancer Left so Precious than she was in all the gitanismo, and most beautiful and discreet than she could be, not between the gypsys, but between whichever beautiful and discreet ones she could announce the fame,). The work, written at the beginning of century XVII, creates the first nonoral precedent in the study of the flamenco origins. But the bells cannot be sent to the flight: the novelesco character of history reduces realism to him, reason why the data cannot be considered like empiricist. Nevertheless, towards 1740 it is necessary to so indicate the existence of a libreto written by hand by a Loquacious Rebel who tells a chronicle us in which he indicates how the granddaughter of Balthasar Montes (the oldest gypsy of Triana) was going to dance with stringed instruments and percussion to the noble houses of Seville. He himself author gives account of the cruelty whereupon the troops of Castile treat to the population of Triana in the occasion of “the General Prison of the Gypsys”, dictated in 1749. |
However, same diatriba that with gitanilla arises with the map reading marruecas from Jose Scaffold, in 1789, a series of epistles that a called Moor Gazel Horseradish tree sends to his Horseradish tree friend. |
In this work the writer describes one juerga gypsy in cortijo led by the Uncle Gregorio, data that the existence of a peculiar and differentiating music in Andalusia corroborates. Towards 1820 this is confirmed with the appearance in a newspaper of Cadiz of the news that in the Theater of the Ball Antonio Monge it will make the four poles (the one of Round, the one of Tobalo, the one of Sherry and the one of Cadiz) and in 1885 the Sejuela young lady, in the hall Barrier Seville, will dance by soleá. Finally, Baile in Triana that describes to Serafín Estébanez Calderón in its Scenes Andalusian (1862), where are the flamenco singers the Planet and its student the Fillo, closes the circle around the conjectures on the origin of the flamenco one. |
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As of this moment there is a clear conclusion: the sort has more than two centuries of life, something that is confirmed when Demófilo founds the flamencología publishing on 1882 its Collection of you sing flamenco. |
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| Origin of “the flamenco” word |
Another one of the aspects that cause that this art is a true mystery is in defining which is the exact origin of “the flamenco” term. Multiple theories exist about the génesis of this word, although perhaps the most spread she is the defendant by Bias Infant in his book Origins of the flamenco thing and secret of it sings jondo. According to the father of the Autonomy Andalusian, “the flamenco” word drift of the Arab terms felah-mengus, that together mean “nomadic farmer”. Also the peculiar theory got to have many followers that affirmed that flamenco it was the name of a knife or knife. Not in vain, in sainete the soldier fanfarrón, written by González of the Castle in century XVIII, can be read: “Melitar, that removed for my husband, a flamenco one”. In another song gathered by Rodriguez Marín he says: “If me s'ajuma er pescao/and I pull out of a scabbard er flamenco/with forty puñalás/was going away to finish off the story”. Nevertheless, this hypothesis has not gotten to extend, as it either did not do in his day the one that it sentenced that the name had occurred him to the sort by the called bird flamenco. The responsibility of this rule also must to Rodriguez Marín, who justified the idea arguing that the flamenco singers practiced sings dresses with short jacket, were high and broken of waist, reason why they were looked like the long-legged bird of he himself name. |
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Like the previous ones, also it follows without corroborating the theory led by experts like Hipólito Rossy or Carlos Almond tree in which one affirms that the flamenco word must to that the polifónica music of Spain in century XVI was increased with the Netherlands, that is to say, with the old Flandes. This theory also was defended, although with shades, by the romantic traveller George Borrow and Hugo Schuchard, among others. According to these writers, formerly which was thought that the gypsys were of Germanic origin, explains that it was possible to be called to them flamenco. |
Finally, two hypotheses exist less it jeopardize, but quite interesting. Antonio Machado and Alvarez, Demófilo, says that “the gypsys call gachós to the Andalusians and these to the gypsys call them flamenco, without we know which is the cause of this denomination”. And Manuel Garci'a Bushes affirms: “Flamenco he comes from the jargon used at the end of century XVIII and principles of the XIX to catalogue everything what means ostentoso, pretencioso or fanfarrón or, as we could determine of form Andalusian generically, “echao p'alante””. |
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| Evolution. Hermetic stage. First flamenco singers |
To the margin of the keys that the history of Literature has contributed for the study of the origin of the flamenco one, data, many still without demonstrating, that exist they speak of ancient flamenco. The reference to a figure cannot be avoided that during long time thought that he was the first flamenco singer of history: the jerezano Uncle Luis of the Julian one, name that created many conflicts between the flamencólogos of long ago, because one never reached an agreement on his biography. Today that discussion is intrascendente, since it follows without demonstrating at least that it existed. |
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However, of those who yes certain reference is had is of the first artists of century XVIII in Triana, that along with Jerez and Cadiz is the enclave in which the flamenco one stops being an expression folkloric to become an artistic sort. It is necessary to mention to flamenco singers like the Planet, that although seems to be that it was born in the Bay of Cadiz - it thinks that in Real Port, it developed all his art in the Sevillian suburb singing by seguiriyas - of his own creation and by tonás. His main student was the Fillo, gypsy also coming from gaditanas earth that a loving relation with the Andonda maintained, to that had been many years of difference. Probably outside this woman first in singing by soleá, although existed other families flamenco singers in Triana, like the Pelaos and the Cagancho, to which this wood can be attributed to them. At first soleá arose as it sings bailable, until the potters of the Sevillian district began to make nonsubject styles without support to compass. Then also one sang by romances and drop hammers, styles connected with toná. Parallelly, in Sherry and the Ports important flamenco nuclei are developed. For history the name of Alpaca as much has left the Light, mythical seguiriyero from which descends almost all the great jerezanos flamenco singers, as of the Crazy person Mateo, Manuel Molina, Diego the Marrurro, Joaquin Lacherna or Mercé the Serneta, that soon would be transferred to Utrera. and in the Bay the Rock, Curro Durse, Enrique Gordo or Enrique Jiménez make history the Blind person Fernandez the Twin one. Nevertheless, that stage, “hermetic” call by Ricardo Molina and Antonio Mairena in its book World and forms of sing flamenco, continues being an incognito for the students, because there are few documents written that contribute light to the analyses. Shortly after, however, everything would become. The inheritance that a called boy Silverio Franconetti received from the Fillo in Marón of the Border would be key for the future of a sort that until then had not left the particular celebrations. |
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The great creators. The Golden age. The singing coffees. |
By the end of century XIX the flamenco one already was an art very extended by all Andalusia. In Cadiz, mother of sings by cantiñas, arise figures like the Chiclanita, Dolores and Alonso of the Brush, Jose of the Kings and the Black of the Port and centers are certifican flamenco singers like the Ports, San Fernando, Sanlúcar, Chiclana and Arcos.
Separate mention deserves Sherry of the Border, another one of the first points of the flamenco one, mainly through the districts of Santiago and San Miguel. Of the Tower and Don Antonio Chacón are nothing there less than Manuel Soto Loreto.
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Nevertheless, a little before these teachers burst in, the history of the flamenco one confronts a little while nails. At a same time flamenco singers like Silverio Franconetti, Takings the Nitri and Juan Breva agree. Among them a ferocious competition arises, until the point in which the Nitri refuses to sing in front of Silverio not to be in a ridiculous assumption before the teacher of Italian ancestry, according to, or not to transmit the essence to him of you sing gypsys, according to others. Be as it is, the First Gold Key of Cante of history is for Takings, that the award receives as flattery to its masters during a celebrated celebration does not know if in the coffee Without Ceiling of Malaga or in Sherry, in which General Sanchez Mira was made an impression with his sings. All these circumstances could have ignited the spark in Silverio, that when seeing the passions that raised east art decided to mount a singing coffee in number 4 of the Sevillian street Rosary. At this moment, the flamenco one is professionalized.
Nevertheless, in spite of the pull which they stick in the society the mentioned coffees, a certain sector of the sort maintains sings in the minorities of long ago. It is the case, for example, of the Fat people of Alcala, a family of trianero origin whose greater representative is, according to Antonio Mairena, Joaquin the one of the Paula, or, later, of Uncle Jose de Sherry Paula and Agujetas the Old one. At this time they prevail by the scenes over all Spain the Coquineras, the Macarrona, Don Antonio Chacón, Francisco Motto, Fosforito Old - the main adversary of the teacher jerezano-, the Perote, the Mochuelo, the Macaca, the Morning call, Cayetano Muriel the Boy of Goat, the Canary, Fernando the Blacksmith, the Blonde of the Per them or the Garrido de Jerez, among other many. We are already in century xx. And in the Twenties a matchless generation returns the witness of the art. They already begin to sound to the names of Shepherd Pavón Cruz the Girl of the Combs, Arturo and Tomás Pavón, Manuel Torre, Manuel Vallejo.
El Gloria, Las Pompis, Juanito Mojama, Bernardo el de los Lobitos, El Niño Escacena, Pepe el de la Matrona , Manuel Centeno, El Cojo de Málaga, Juan Varea, Pepe Pinto, Sebastián el Pena, El Niño de Marchena, Manolo Caracol, Tía Anica la Piriñaca , Tío Gregario el Borrico y Juan Talega.
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El concurso de 1922 en Granada |
When they begin to decidedly arise the professionals from sings, the dance and the touch, certain compatible sectors of the intellectuality to the generation of the 27 begin to fear for “the pure thing”. Teachers as Manuel de Falla or Federico Garci'a Larca has an apocalyptic vision of the flamenco one, since for them this one must be an art of the town, a reduced to the minority Andalusian, and not comercializable style. The fear by the loss of which they call “purity” takes to them to create the First Aid of Sings Jondo, celebrated in Granada in 1922, in which the only exigency was that the aspirings were not known, people of the town, and nonfigures already consecrated in the singing coffees. The contest gained the moronense seated in Genil Bridge Diego Bermúdez Cala the Pliers, and a mention of honor to a boy of thirteen years was done to him called Manuel Ortega Juárez, who in the end would turn out to be the famous Manolo Caracol. But the pretensions of the creators of that aid did not grow and, in spite of the efforts to give back the flamenco one to the town, the sort not only continued professionalizing itself, but that the fans were witnesses of a revolution that was increased with slate discs.
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El flamenco en Madrid. La Copa Pavón. Segunda Llave de Oro del Cante |
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The success that sings flamenco had harvested between the public caused that the capital, Madrid, flamenco singer became center from principles of century xx. Most of the artists of reputation they decided to be based in “the Court” to give sense to its artistic race and began to proliferate the spectacles in theaters. Taking advantage of the repercussion the First Aid of 1922 in Granada, the industralist of the Madrilenian Pavón Theater, located in the street Ambassadors, it decided to create the call Pavón Glass, an award that would serve to increase prestige of the awarded flamenco singer. The end was celebrated the 24 of August of 1925 and the participants were the Boy Escacena, Pepe Marchena, the Cripple of Malaga, the Mochuelo and Manuel Vallejo, who would be the unquestionable winner from the contest. Nevertheless, a year later the thing changed. The triunfador was Manuel Centeno, who interpreted magnificent saetas, but in the spirit of all it was that she must again have fallen of the side of Vallejo, reason why was own Don Antonio Chacón the one who decided, in I make amends for, to give the Second Gold Key of Cante to the Sevillian teacher, who received the flattery founded by the Nitri of hands of Manuel Torre.
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| Another theory affirms that the delivery of the key was product of a campaign of marketing of the owner of the Pavón Theater. The case is that all this equipment, repeated in multitude of occasions by different points from Spain, generated what later it has occurred in calling the “flamenco opera”, without a doubt the stage most controversial of the sort. |
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Tanto los textos como algúnas de las imágenes así como lor archivos musicales, han sido extraídos del libro "Guía del Flamenco de Andalucía", editado por la Junta de Andalucía en el año 2004 |
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