Flamenco Puro by Rafael de Utrera on Saturday was so much fun. It was such an impressive performance that made the crowd go “Oley” every few minutes. “Oley” seems to be the Spanish equivalent of “Wah wah” or “bale” (Tamil). There were 5 artists, the vocalist, a guitarist, a dancer who also played guitar and sang when she was not busy dancing, a percussionist and a violinist (or was there one? )
The concert was mind blowing. The high pitch and voice control required for singing flamenco is amazing. Rafael had so much control, a voice with no shrill and a lot of passion for his music. The program started with a very important announcement. No, not just to keep the cell phones off or silent, they asked us not to clap with the artist in his rhythm. A normal applause was okay but not a rhythmic one since the claps are important to maintain the artist’s rhythm. Made me wonder if flamenco had something similar to the claps (taal) of Indian classical music.
My bit of copy paste from WIkipedia here: Apparently Flamenco is music form which developed only in the late 18th Century. And flamenco’s home town is Andalusia. It looks like there has been a lot of influence of Muslim and Spanish folk (Christian) influence in the development of this music form. The history of Flamenco seems as complex as the music itself.
There was an opportunity for everybody to showcase their skills except for one person. Rafael started with a small but dramatic piece setting the tone for the evening and getting all audience excited. The guitarist played a couple of excellent pieces. And the dancer was exceptional. She played the guitar for a couple of pieces and she danced amazingly well. Her feet were weaving magic on the stage. I could not believe feet could move so fast with such amazing rhythm complementing the music so well.
The percussionist was giving the necessary rhythm for audience to tap their feet with the dancer.
They closed the program with an impromptu piece with Rafel singing and the others joining him with their rhythmic claps and the dancer joining them with her awesome feet tapping to their rhythm. Flamenco dance is damn passionate for sure. I loved watching the dance. Rafael also danced impromptu for a couple of minutes and was really good.
Over all it was such an awesome performance by great artists. Now, the standard nonsense that came to my mind
1) Every song in Flamenco seems to start with “ee yayee yayee ouuu”
2) I sure did feel there was Muslim influence in the music since sometimes the high pitch sounded like the prayer from a mosque.
3) The percussionist had a drum like the Djembe in front of him but he rarely used it (was it just twice and both for less than a minute?). He was sitting on something like a box speaker and drumming on the speaker. Why did he even bother to bring that Djembe kind of thing? Why would you park yourself on a speaker and use that as the percussion instrument too. Irrespective of that, the percussion was awesome.
4) The Spanish conversation between the audience and Rafel was nice to listen to in spite of the fact that i did not understand a word of it.
5) Only the people performing for the piece were in the stage.and the rest of them moved out. They came only when they were needed.
6) Now, coming back to the violinist. I had a feeling that i saw him walk in the middle of one song and play for about 3 or 4 minutes and i did not see him afterwards. I thought he was just an illusion and the reason lack of blood alcohol in my body since it was a Saturday evening. I picked up a beer in the break and after that i did not see the violinist. I saw the same guy at the end of the performance. After all i just had one beer which could not have kept blood alcohol level for long so the illusion came back.
On a serious note, he did his job well when he played for the few minutes.
7) Someone must have told Rafael his clothes looked very odd in America. When he came back to sing after the few minutes break he came back looking a little more American than he was at the start :)
8) With a high heel shoe like that the dance must have been extremely hard. The woman did not seem to feel sorry for her feet and was tapping them so hard with those high heeled shoes. I had a doubt if she had some kind of a wooden leg fixed just for the performance. Man! What a dance. It was a pleasure to listen and watch, but surely not something feet are going to like.
On a serious note, the woman was full of grace and elegance in her dancing.
That sums up my great musical experience at the Kirkland Performance Center. Oh that reminds me. The place was just wonderful. One of the best performance halls i have been to.
