Unit on Flamenco

1. What is Flamenco?
Flamenco is not only a determined artistic, musical and dance
expression, but a culture, since it has its own unique language.
Known for its great emotional intensity, flamenco is distinguished by its
graceful arm movements, fierce stomping, deep wailing and guitar
strumming.

2. Origen and influences of Flamenco

Flamenco was born in the middle of the 18th century in Andalusia. But
its roots go back to older times. This art has dance and musical
elements that already existed in the different cultures that contributed to
its birth.
Flamenco was born in a multicultural environment. Gypsies, Arabs,
Jews and Christians mixed elements of their respective cultures with
traditional Andalusian elements. They also incorporated African
influences that they picked up from African slaves passing through
Andalusia and from Caribbean people arriving in Spain.

Influences:
● Songs from: sinagoga
● Songs from: gregorianos
● The popular songs fromSpain
● Traditional andalusian music
● Arabic sounds
● African rhythms

3. Characteristics of Flamenco Music

In traditional flamenco music we cannot talk about songs. Since
flamenco musical pieces do not have the structure of a song
(intro-verse-chorus...).
Flamenco music is distributed in styles (palos). Each style has a
different language, structure and characteristics. However, there are
some elements of the music that we find in all flamenco music:

1. Melisma: Group of successive notes that are sung on a

single syllable. This technique is found in Gregorian chant,
Arabic, Jewish and Gypsy chants.

2. Call and response: succession of two different musical

phrases, generally performed by different musicians, the
second phrase being a direct comment, or response, to the
first phrase.

3. Amalgam rhythm: combines a binary and a ternary

compass, that is, it alternates 6/8 and 3/4 or 3/4 and 6/8, a
combination that gives rise to a 12-beat musical metric, which
is the rhythmic base of many flamenco styles.

4. Flamenco cadence: Particularly, the Andalusian cadence

consists of four chords. The first of them is minor and the
remaining three are major. The formula is as follows: I - VII - VI -
V (originally formed on the notes La-Sol-Fa-Mi).