April 28 2012

Paco de Lucia played the Paramount Theater last night as part of SF Jazz.  I have a pretty strict definition of genius:  an artist who changes the way practitioners think of the medium.  Picasso, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Jimi Hendrix.  You can work through them, but you ignore them at your peril.  Miles said "I changed the music five or six times", and indeed he did.  Birth of the Cool, Walking, Kind of Blue, ESP, Silent Way, Bitches Brew, changed the way we thought, and felt, about music.  Paco, from his astounding work with Camaron, to Entre Dos Aguas, to Siroco, Zyryab, and Luzia, continually changes the way flamencos view their art form.  Originally criticized by "purists", his command of traditional material and technique is without equal.  His genius is in continually evolving and renewing the art form.  He is one of a handful of the most accomplished musicians on earth; Ravi Shankar comes to mind. This concert featured the great vocalist Duquende, and the spectacular young dancer Farru.  Paco was greeted with a standing ovation.  As is his custom, the opening piece was solo, a beautiful rondena.  The encore segued from Guardian Angels by John McLaughlin (which they used to play together) into Entre Dos Aguas.  In between were two hours of seamless magic.  Bravo Paco! 

Number 27 December 1, 2009

“Steal from everyone but yourself” Igor Stravinsky

How ideas travel. A couple of years ago Paco de Lucia released Cositas Buenas. Like Miles, Paco has changed the way players think about the music several times, and I always buy his recordings the minute they come out. It’s a marvelous record, as his records always are. Imagine my delighted shock, when the last track, Casita Bernardo, has a trumpet line that repeats the melody of my tune Jeanetta (from my Ananda recording) note for note throughout the tune as the main hook. I like to think I have a pretty healthy ego, but I don’t have a picture of Paco buying 15 year old Gregory James cds for inspiration. Then I noticed that the trumpet player (with the exception of some orchestral recordings, I don’t believe Paco has used a trumpet in a small group setting) is Jerry Gonzalez. Jerry is a New York avant-garde jazz player. The trumpet player on my recording Jeanetta, is Ron Miles, also a modern player who has recorded with Bill Frisell and has several recordings under his own name. My thinking is Jerry probably heard Jeanetta (which has overtones of the flamenco toque taranta) years ago, and somehow the melody stuck in the back of his mind. Many years later when asked to play over a similar harmonic structure (albeit a rumba), the melody came back to him. Again, I was delighted. I probably picked up the melody from somewhere myself.

Gregory James