For many, including some Spanish people I know, flamenco has become inextricably linked with tourism, sunshine and having a good time. But this is a far cry from the Flamenco experienced by the poet Frederico Garcia Lorca, who wrote:
“Duende could only be present when one sensed that death was possible.”
Duende is the mysterious spirit of flamenco, that can be felt but not described or explained. Even in the urbane confines of Sadler’s Wells Flamenco retains its ritualistic aspect. It was only a mild surprise to discover that the Jaleo, the percussive handclapping and foot stomping, can be translated as ‘hell raising’, though to me it seems that it’s mainly ancestral spirits who are being called and honoured. Flamenco runs in families, with current singers, dancers and musicians often being the product of many generations. But the performers can also pay tribute to the great stars of the past. The remarkable Sara Bara turned her 2016 show Voces, Suite Flamenco into an actual ritual, lighting a lantern on stage and surrounded by large pictures of her Flamenco ancestors, making them a very tangible presence.
The term flamenco only came into use in the C18 but its roots go back much further and spread through different cultures. Some trace it to the C8, and the Arab occupation of Spain, others to the arrival in Andalucia of gypsies from India in 1425. After the Catholic monarchy took power they attempted to erase all other cultures, Gypsy, Jewish and Moorish, and these persecuted peoples took refuge in the mountains where they lived in ‘relative harmony’. Flamenco is a fusion of these cultures, their ancestral roots and their histories. It includes voice, dance and guitar, as well as the percussive rhythms of hands and feet.
Some flamenco is so fierce I wonder that no one in the audience dies. Once I did see an ambulance waiting outside Sadler’s Wells as I left the theatre. No ‘sound bath’ can be more effective than the deep, challenging voice of the Flamenco singer, especially those in the ‘cante jondo’ or ‘deep song’ tradition.
Throughout its more recent history there’s been a tension between popularity and purity. In the ’golden age’ of flamenco, 1850-1910, when Café Cantantes were opened in many Spanish Cities, flamenco became increasingly popular, but moved away from its gypsy roots. Some flamenco artists refused to perform in these cabaret style clubs and returned to their villages where they kept their traditions alive. In 1922 the poet Lorca and the composer Manuel de Falla were among a group who tried to restore the authentic ‘cante jondo’ by initiating a competition held in the gardens of the Alhambra Palace in Grenada. Flamenco only re-emerged after the Civil War and the Second World War, but again there were tensions between commercialization and authenticity, this time in the context of the growing tourist industry. It’s said that Franco saw flamenco as a way to entice more tourists to Spain, boosting his country economy. The new flamenco clubs that sprung up along the Costa de Sol again threatened to disconnect the culture from its roots.
Flamenco festivals have ensured the survival and maintained the diversity of flamenco. The first festival was held in 1957 in Utrera, in Seville; this was soon to be followed by many other small towns and villages. Performers from different regions were able to reassert their cultural traditions. Today flamenco festivals have spread around the world, offering audiences the chance to see stars from the great flamenco dynasties as well as artists who are reinventing the form, such as the gender fluid Manuel Linan. Some companies have fused different dance forms and cultures. The debate about purity goes on, but the duende still flows wherever the performers are attuned to the ancestral roots of flamenco.