There are versions for all tastes

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When Paco gave me a guitar – The things (XI)

When I ran the German record label in the early nineties Deutsche Grammophon Spain I made a campaign that arose from a comment by the then mayor of Madrid, and a great consumer of classical music, Alberto Ruiz Gallardon, who, after having released two albums with the Sonata in Yes de Franz Liszt, in separate recordings of Ivo Pogorelich y Christian Zimmerman, he expressed his surprise that we were competing with ourselves with two recordings of the same work. And I remember that I said to him, without thinking: “There are versions for all tastes”And with that improvised slogan I made, as I say, a small advertising campaign with different versions of the DG catalogue.

While for classical music the versions are the salt of the repertoire, in the flamenco are part of its essence. How boring would our most universal art be without the different ways in which the cantes are recreated even by the same performer. What would become of the flamenco si Pastora y Thomas, even though they were brothers, did not interpret a cante de the Sernet so differently from each other. That is the greatness of the flamenco, the notable differences that exist between the different versions of the variants of a certain style. Variations that sometimes make us doubt whether a variant is one or another.

The same is true for the guitar. In the case of great masters such as Paco de Lucia, Manolo Sanlucar o Vicente Friend What always attracted me the most when I attended their concerts was how they would approach the different pieces of their repertoire, to what extent they would vary the original invoice of their works with liberties that they themselves allow themselves. We must not forget that the creative act never ends. A composer never considers a work finished. If you let him, there is always something to improve. And in the flamenco From the moment you go into the studio and record a certain touch and it is fixed on the record, you can only improve it through the different variations you make in the interpretations you make of this touch in concerts. That's why I like live records so much.

«I do not conceive the flamenco If there weren't different versions of the same music. Everyone has their preferences, one likes Marchena, another Mairena, this one Fernanda, another La Paquera, I like all of them. There are different tastes, and the beauty lies in that richness and variety, precisely because there are different versions for different tastes.

When I write this I am listening to Paco's CD with the recordings of the Montreaux Festival where the genius from Algeciras recreates a handful of classics from his repertoire with so many variations from the original that One ends up entering into the soul of the concert performer, observing his exceptional creative intelligence.. The variations are so noticeable that when I first heard the record Luzia both the joys Ammunition Street like the rondeña Camarón They seemed to me to be advanced versions of the alegrías and rondeña from the album Sirocco, The Barrosa y My boy CurroIt seemed that, from playing them live so much, new works had emerged and he had recorded them with new titles.

However, there are works that require recreational discipline, so to speak. For example, my teacher Antonio gades He did not change a single step of a work once it had premiered. And the steps had to be recreated exactly as he had conceived them. This was normal, given that, if in Carmen At least 25 people participate between dancing, playing and cante, it wouldn't be very smart to go around changing the steps. It's better to stick to the movements of the choreography if you don't want to ruin a scene. A solo dance within a ballet is another thing, there can be more liberties. There is an anecdote that someone told me Emilio de Diego, who was Gades' faithful squire on the guitar for thirty years, who when a very young Paco de Lucía was in Antonio's company did not last long because every night he did different things, he added here, varied there, shortened there, and that for a dancer means ruin, which translated into that After a tour in Brazil he did not play for Gades again.

And in this regard, I'm going to tell you something I've never told before. After the premiere of Fuenteovejuna There were two numbers that seemed long to me, but Antonio didn't want to hear about making changes. He had worked hard enough to create that monumental ballet without having to change things. But at the third performance I thought that if instead of me suggesting the change, someone from outside did it, perhaps Antonio would agree. At the premiere in Genoa, a close friend of Gades, the Italian composer, was with us. Tony Renis, author of none other than the classic When when when. I told him: “Toni, he doesn't listen to me, why don't you tell him to shorten the time a little?” Bolero by Orellana and Clothing of the Commander”. And so he did. The next day, Antonio called me into the dressing room and with his hoarse voice he said to me: “We’re going to shorten two long numbers from the ballet.” Hahaha. It was the only time he changed anything in his works, some of which have been on stage for fifty years, just as they were premiered by the genius from Elda raised in Vallecas.

The liberties that performers take when recreating the repertoire, although they are sometimes supervised by a legion of "pseudo-commissioners" guardians of a supposed purity that only exists in their feverish and narrow minds, are the salt of art. jondo, and this does not only happen in the flamenco. Classical music, jazz, pop, all genres of music are open to versions that enrich the repertoire, some with better luck than others, of course, but thanks to the fact that we can change tracks with a click, the matter is settled. I cannot conceive the flamenco if there were no different versions of the same music. Everyone has their preferences, one likes Marchena, to another Mairena, to this Fernanda, to the other The Paquera, to me all of them. There are different tastes, and the beauty lies in that richness and variety, precisely because there are different versions for different tastes.