Hello students of The Flamenco Palos group course, private lesson students, and anyone who is even remotely curious about flamenco!
I would love to get some flamenco discussion active in this forum. Also, many newcomers to flamenco have similar questions, it’d be great to have students ask questions publicly. I’ll respond as soon as I can, and anyone else (student or teacher) who can advise, recommend, or otherwise contribute is also welcome to jump in.
If you don’t have any questions to start out with, just tell us about what got you interested in flamenco! When and where did you first hear it? Did it grab you instantly, or grow on you little by little? Whose music has inspired you the most?
No questions yet but on the topic of inspirations for flamenco i think it was seeing a show called 'alba flamenca' at the edinburgh festival that first impressed me. I love the passion and that the guitar role generally sounds fast and challenging. On my 2nd trip to Seville we came to la bienal and was very impressed by the closing concert staring Pastora Galvan. In terms of flamenco guitarists it has been the obvious choice of Paca de Luca that has impressed me most so far - but very willing to keep listening to others and appreciate more.
Hey Leah, Thanks for creating this space for questions. I did want to ask you about practicing. Since we began I've been practicing daily by rolling through all the palos we;ve played so far and working on those pieces. You've also mentioned one or two exercises (arpeggio and left hand warm up) that I've been incorporating. I think my practicing could be better though. I don't know a lot of good warm ups and then once I start practicing I'm not really sure how to focus my time, I feel a little lost and just end up playing what we've done but not necessarily feeling like I improve. I was hopng you could offer some practice tips for those of us who don't have a solid practice routine. Gracias!
Greatly appreciate the opportunity to read more about flamenco. Questions surely will be arising. In due course, when the practising intensifies.
Hi all, thank you so much for jumping in!
Phil, that’s a terrific introduction to flamenco in Seville by seeing Pastora Galván at the bienal -great first choice. And Paco de Lucia is also a great choice, of course. I’d suggest paying attention to the guitarists whose pieces you really like in the playlists I make, and then exploring their music further.
Maggie, thanks for saying hello : ) I (and we) are here for questions / food for thought whenever you’re ready.
Luis, that’s a great question about how to spend your practice time.
In general, I recommend dividing your practice time into a few categories:
Regarding this course, we are covering a lot of material in a relatively short amount of time. How to approach it depends a bit on your situation, but one thing is for sure - you’ll have to choose what to focus on at first.
Any time you feel like you haven’t made progress in a practice session, it’s usually because you’ve bitten off more than you can chew, and didn’t break down your goals/intentions for that practice session into something reasonable.
For this course, I’d advise:
2. For the other palos, just listen to them for now. The playlists mainly, but also returning occasionally to the class video to listen to our example. See if you can find the common ground between our example of that palo and what you’ve been hearing.
3. Once you can play SOMETHING from one or two palos well, turn that ‘something’ (basic compás only, basic compás + falseta, or everything), call it ‘repertoire’, which is music that we already know and want to maintain.
4. Then choose your next palo and repeat the process : )
Hope this helps, and talk soon!
Leah
Just checking in to say hello, it's a pleasure to be here and learn from everyone.
Hello everyone!
Leah, thanks for the practice recommendations. I find that at the stage I'm at, I probably need to focus heavily on learning the building-block techniques. I find that I need to learn a lot about right-hand technique and significantly less on the left hand! No doubt I'll have to work the left-hand when I have made a bit of progress on the right hand.
As an older student just beginning, I wonder Leah, if you have any recommendations for warm-up routines. Currently this is my warm-up:
1. Starting with the first string play each string four times rest stroke (Appoyando), move to the next string and continue till I get to the 6th string and then go back. Then play each string again 3 times, then repeat the whole sequence , playing each string 2 times, then once.
2. Repeat the above with free stroke (Tirando). For 1 & 2 I leave the left hand relaxed and not fretting anything
3. Then I start fretting the 1st string at the 12th fret and play the "spider-walk" - play four frets, then move to the 11th fret and repeat, all the way to the first fret and then come back down to the 12th fret on the same string. Then move to the next string and repeat.
4. For the right hand, I do a set of 3 above with appoyando and then a set tirando. I am forcing myself to fret each time at the correct spot just above the fret and I'm also forcing myself to play very slowly and focus on scanning the arms & hands for dysfunctional tension. I am planning, starting tomorrow, to do this with a metronome, but very slowly to get into the disciopline of maintaining rythm.
5. I am also beginning to do some left hand finger independence work (from Scott Tenant's "Pumping Nylon". I also am planning to look at some other exercises from "KItharologous"
Any thoughts/feedback/suggestions welcome! What do you folks do to warm up?
Cheers!
-raaj
Good morning, Raaj!! Thanks for sharing. As an "older" student myself, your warm-up routine is highly appreciated and thx for detailing! Best rgds, Maggie PS: My practice time is 30 min before going to work - so it's more "leisurely". Your diligence, however, inspires me to really sit down AFTER work and get going. And extend my warm-ups (which include merely finger cracking, scales in various positions, some bass lines (left hand), right hand stretches and strokes, arpeggio moves). ;)
Good morning, Raaj!! Thanks for sharing. As an "older" student myself, your warm-up routine is highly appreciated and thx for detailing! Best rgds, Maggie PS: My practice time is 30 min before going to work - so it's more "leisurely". Your diligence, however, inspires me to really sit down AFTER work and get going. And extend my warm-ups (which include merely finger cracking, scales in various positions, some bass lines (left hand), right hand stretches and strokes, arpeggio moves). ;)
Good morning, Raaj!! Thanks for sharing. As an "older" student myself, your warm-up routine is highly appreciated and thx for detailing! Best rgds, Maggie PS: My practice time is 30 min before going to work - so it's more "leisurely". Your diligence, however, inspires me to really sit down AFTER work and get going. And extend my warm-ups (which include merely finger cracking, scales in various positions, some bass lines (left hand), right hand stretches and strokes, arpeggio moves). ;)
Hi all! Raaj, in answer to your warm-up question, many flamenco players - myself and most of my teachers included - have a warm-up/technique routine that encompasses several core flamenco techniques:
1. Rasgueos
2. Arpeggios
3. Picado
4. Thumb
5. Alzapua
6. Tremolo
7. Ligados
You're just getting started, so there hasn't been time to give you exercises in all these areas yet in our private lessons, but little by little we will explore the fundamentals of each technique . Your current routine is a great start! And all of us are continually modifying our technique routines over time. THey change and grow with us.
I've learned many, many exercises in all these areas over the years, and I generally have a list of 10-12 exercises at a given time. (My full technique routine takes 1 to 1.5 hours!). When I've made significant progress on an exercise and gotten it faster and more efficient, I rotate it out for another one that seems to address some sort of challenge for me.
One thing worth noting is the difference between 'warmup' and 'technique' work. They can be the same part of a practice session. But when I sit down to do 'technique' work, I am really thinking hard about what I'm doing, often using a mirror for visual feedback, and have goals in mind for things I'm improving. My technique routine serves as my warmup if I do it at the start of a practice session.
'Warming-up' is something I do at a gig if I arrive and have to get my hands ready to play. Or if I have a short amount of practice time and need to work on something specific that's not technique, I'll do a quick warmup. Not so much thinking, just getting the blood flowing. Rasgueos are a great way to warm up your hands and get you ready for almost anything.
This helps a lot thank you Luis for the question and thank you Leah for the response. Leah, can you explain expand to include the falseta?
Hi Valencia, by 'expand to include the falseta', I just mean, go on to the falseta only AFTER you can play the basic compás.
Hi all! In case anyone else has had an issue with this - starting with tomorrow's class the video uploaded to the class page will be completely 'speaker view' rather than a combination of speaker view (usually me, sometimes student who is addressing/playing for the group) and gallery view (seeing the whole class in a grid).
If anyone needs me to demonstrate something from a past class that they couldn't pick up from the grid view, I'll have plenty of time after class tomorrow for 'retakes'.
Thanks to the student who let me know that this was still an issue (even after I thought I'd fixed it)!
Leah
PS - it looks like I will finish this week's handout on Sunday several hours before class rather than the night before. Will send out a message when it's up in our folder : )
Hi everyone, I really enjoyed teaching the flamenco palos course over the summer. You were all a great group to work with, really positive and fun and I looked forward to every class.
I wanted to share a few things:
1. You might be interested in this post I just wrote explaining more about what to do with the accented beats in compás. This question came up a few times in the course, and I go into a lot of detail here.
2. I'll be teaching two group classes this fall, starting in a few weeks:
(1) Fall flamenco workshop in Alegrias. We'll be exploring the palo Alegrias in depth, along with the fundamental flamenco techniques.
(2) Music theory for guitarists. A group course in music theory, specifically as it applies to the guitar. You'll learn to build chords and scales and make sense of keys and chord progressions, all with guitar in hand. No music notation involved.
3. Do any of you have experience (good or bad) purchasing a guitar online? I've had a lot of students ask me for recommendations, and I'd love to be able to advise better. If you have any thoughts, I'd be grateful for any contributions in this forum thread.
Thanks everyone! Hope you've all enjoyed the rest of your summer and are enjoying the material from the Palos class!
Leah