Interview with Juan Ramírez. Flamenco dancer. 'Más flamenco que el tacón'

Interview
with

JUAN RAMÍREZ

Juan Navas Salguero, “Ramírez” (Mérida,
1959) has had a long career in flamenco dance, but as
a youth he started out as a singer with the greatest
maestros of the era. In 1985 he participated in a European
tour with Paco de Lucía and in 1986 won the “Pastora
Imperio” prize at the Córdoba contest.
The versatile artist never looked back and has been
offering his shows throughout Spain with the country’s
biggest stars. Now he has made a first recording for
which he composed the words and music and even sings
most of the themes.

“I just want to be known
as a dancer”

Manuel Moraga

“Más
flamenco que el tacón” [‘more flamenco
than footwork’]… A title which defines your
dancing quite aptly.
It’s from a bulerías verse I wrote and
which Guadiana sings, “más flamenco que
el tacón, más pillo que la guitarra tengo
yo mi corazón”. There’s a double
meaning: a heart can be more flamenco than footwork.
“More flamenco than a guitar” is a good-natured
wink at Paco de Lucía (I’m very fond of
Paco and learned a great deal from him), a bit like
saying the guitar is well and good, and the dance also
deserves its rightful place, but it’s all with
the best of intentions. It’s my take on dance.
Dancing is footwork for me, without sound, it doesn’t
seem like flamenco dance, I’d call it “danza”.

It’s not often a dancer
makes a record. The more logical thing is a DVD. In
this case, it’s both formats.
It was an idea I’d had for a long time. As the
center of attention, I think footwork can be fantastic.
It’s that sound that’s in the forefront.
I didn’t do everything I really wanted because
it’s very expensive to rent a studio and spend
the time I wanted to take, but I think it’s very
good and I’m already considering a second record
that will be done will a longer preparation.

What audience did you have
in mind when you made this record? Who do you expect
will purchase it?
I want it to reach the whole world.

Ver ficha disco y muestras en Real Audio

“Dancing is footwork
for me, without sound, I’d call it ‘danza’”

Your dancing, aside from
the visual aspect, is like another instrument, and at
the same time, you’re the orchestra condutor.
Exactly. Right now I’m going through good times.
I’m evolving and I think dance has the same potential
as any other instrument if it comes from the heart,
with feeling, trying to give the audience your best.

We hear a lot from singers
and guitarists about how difficult it is to record these
days…you have only to look at the limited output over
the course of a year. Was it difficult for a dancer
to manage to get a recording like this made?
I really put everything into it because dance needs
to be up there, and I hope other dancers will take the
plunge as well and make more records like this, because
it’s a way of making people aware of flamenco
dance, and people get hooked. It’s also a way
of selling dance to people abroad.

How long was this idea incubating?
Ever since I was with Paco de Lucía en 1985,
and I recorded “Siroco” with him in 1986.
Then I recorded “Misa Flamenca” that same
year with Enrique Morente, and I was also on Camarón’s
last recording. Since that time I was always thinking
of making a record with footwork. I began working on
this five years ago, and just finished a few months
ago.

Let’s talk about the
CD, which includes some important collaborations.
A good fire needs several pieces of wood to be strong.
I’m talking about the relationship between guitar
and dance. There’s also one number with drums.
I was talking to Paco about this, but he had projects
of his own and couldn’t participate. The next
record, I hope he pitches in with a ‘guajira’
or something. Then there’s Remedios, Parrita,
Raimundo Amador, Guadiana… A lot of good people on
the record, and I’m delighted because I needed
good solid flamenco artists.

But
your footwork is present throughout the record, from
beginning to end: counterpoint, center-stage, dialoguing
with the other instruments…
Exactly. Heelwork is the star of the record, in addition
to the people who are with me, but the idea was to highlight
the heelwork.

The record has three bulerías…
There was another one, a Charlie Parker theme, with
El Paquete playing, but we had to cut it out because
the family wouldn’t give permission. The Spanish
Society of Authors (SGAE) even sent a petition to the
U.S. It was a great bulería, but we couldn’t
include it on the record.

And fandangos de Huelva…
A danced fandango de Huelva was never before included
on a record. But fandango de Huelva is a perfectly legitimate
dance. Dancers are afraid of it. I’m becoming
braver about exploring other perfectly danceable styles,
such as verdiales… But people are overly cautious.
Since no one dances it, nobody wants to put their foot
in it so to speak. Now for example I want to dance the
‘guajira’ which is seldom danced, the ‘garrotín’,
almost lost, a very flamenco dance. You can do anything,
it just takes the time and interest. You have to seek
it out, the way musicians seek out music. Dance is exactly
the same. When you’re not completely sure, the
first day it might not come out quite the way you want,
but the second day it’s better. It’s a way
of investigating.

“I’m going through a creative stage now,
giving musical form to my dance”

“American gipsie”…sounds like something
from the early days of Pata Negra.
The title is sort of to get a laugh. Raimundo and me
have been friends since childhood. We’re the same
generation. I love the guy, and he loves me, we grew
up together in Seville. So he came and did this piece
for me…the kind of thing Raimundo does, very pretty.
And I found a really nice interpretation, it’s
a funky rumba. It was quite a novelty for me, I never
would have thought of dancing a “funk rumba”.

On that number, and the following
one, you sing…this is a facet of yours I never knew…
Well, my first experience in flamenco was singing, as
a child. They called me “el gitanillo de oro”
(‘the golden gypsy boy’). I made two ‘singles’
when I was nine. I had to give it up when my voice changed,
because I didn’t have a flamenco voice. But I
do like to sing. Every so often you catch me singing.
Paco de Lucía also sings on his records. He’s
got a voice like the guys who deliver bottled gas, but
it’s okay. If the maestro does it, the rest of
us might as well too. If you do it with spirit… What
I said about the delivery guys was just a joke, no offense
intended.

There are two numbers basically
devoted to dance, to your heelwork: “Tío
Duende” and “Chaparrón”. Why
“Tío Duende”?
Tío Duende is a dancer in Palma de Mallorca,
but he’s a gypsy guy from Murcia who went there
very young. I met him when I was sixteen, when I was
starting to dance, and he made a big impact on me. He
had very strong feet, like an athlete. That made a big
impression and I really love the guy. He taught me a
few little steps and I treasure them. He’s never
been to Madrid or Sevilla and his talent hasn’t
been recognized. But he was a great inspiration for
me, and that bulería is dedicated to him.

“Chaparrón”
you define as a “tribal rumba”, and the
fact is, it does have a certain African sound.
It’s an upbeat rumba a little different from the
ordinary, from a rumba of Parrita’s and tangos
of Remedios. It’s flamenco, but a bit of a tangent.

You wind up with “Soy
quinaor”…
Yes, my grandfather was a gypsy ‘quinaor’.
These are people who get by as petty thieves. He used
to say there were towns where gypsies weren’t
allowed to enter. If they couldn’t go in to make
a living, what were they supposed to do?

You also sing in that…what
does cante represent for Juan Ramírez?
Cante is a very important means of communication. First
of all, it’s speech…when you sing you speak,
you say things. It’s a person’s feeling,
his music, and then, whatever he happens to be talking
about. It’s something tremendous. The guitar is
also tremendous, and dance…but singing, perhaps moreso
because it’s the voice and words of the individual.

In the lyrics you mention
some major figures…
The whole thing is a tribute to Carmen Amaya, more than
anything else. I also learned a lot from Paco, Camarón…and
of course from Farruco. Those four.

“Flamenco singing
is as immense as the sea”

Would you say you’re
in a stage of personal and artistic maturity?
Yes. And I don’t take it lightly. I’ve lost
speed dancing. I’m not twenty years old any more,
but I think I’m dancing better now than ever before:
with more strength, more meaning, richer. I’ve
lost the youthful impetus, but that’s not everything.
I’m going through a creative stage now, working
with other instruments and giving musical form to my
dance. I used to improvise much more; I’d just
go out and dance, without instruments or anything. But
for about four or five years now I’ve been involved
with percussion, with the cajón, flute, violin,
and I have to make it all work with my footwork so it
makes sense. Every sound I make, they have to reciprocate
with music, and I think it’s a way of enriching
dance.

Alegrías, siguiriya
por martinete and tangos…why did you choose these
particular dances for the DVD?
They’re three very traditional styles, and very
different from each other. There are softer and stronger
colors, that’s how flamenco is.

Your dancing could be described
as “racial”, basic, with no artificial additives…
I dance the way I feel. My dance is mostly in my feet,
which is how I understand flamenco dance. There are
people who understand it with their hands, their torsos…
I don’t criticize anyone’s form of interpretation,
each one transmits the way he or she feels it has to
be done, but I just want to be a dancer. People can
take it or leave it, but I don’t want to be anything
more than a dancer. I wish people would stop messing
with me because I don’t do classic dance, because
I’m a flamenco dancer. For better or worse, that’s
all I want to be. I never pretended to be anything else.

Flamenco
dancer, not ballet dancer…
Flamenco dance in Spain is too influenced by classic
dance. I’m defending flamenco by hook or by crook,
it’s what I like most. Like some people say, I’m
a dancer from the waist down. That’s how I feel
flamenco dance. I met Farruco twenty-seven or twenty-eight
years ago in Seville, at Los Gallos, and he was the
first one who said to me “can’t you take
it a little easier?” And I told him “look
man, I’m learning, I don’t know”.
And Farruco says “naturally, you’re very
young, you can’t slow down now. You’ve got
lots of power and vitality”. It’s my way
of understanding dance. Like I said before, dancing
is feet, if there’s no sound, I can’t call
it flamenco, it’s classical dance.

Did it make you nervous knowing
your dancing was being recorded to be seen throughout
the world?
There’s no more beginner’s butterflies.
Now it’s another kind of nervousness: the responsibility,
the need to do a good job, something nice for the audience,
first something that I think is good, and then let the
general public decide. Before you go out, look, the
audience always makes you a little nervous, but it’s
professional nervousness, not beginnger’s.

On the record Parrita mentions
Curro and de Paula…who are your favorite bullfighters?
In actual fact, Parrita mentioned two purists of the
bullring, because Rafael de Paula and Curro Romero are
like two old dancers, but from the world of bullfighting.
These are the ones who were most frightened of bulls,
but when they came face to face with a bull, they did
what they had to do, and it was pure art. Because that’s
how it is, it can’t be changed. I see people in
front of the bull, very young, very this, that and the
other thing, they’re great bullfighters of course,
but they don’t have that grace and that art that
come to these people at just the right moment, and that’s
when you see the greatness they carry inside. That has
to be understood. These aren’t ordinary everyday
people. They have to await their moment.

What keeps you going work-wise?
My love of flamenco, that’s what inspires me.
For dancing especially. Guitar and cante too, of course,
but what keeps me going is dance. It’s a way of
communicating my feelings to the world. Flamenco is
what keeps me wanting to go on.

What interests does Juan
Ramírez have?
Right now I like ‘audio’. I’m learning
my way around a recording studio. I think it’s
a very interesting world, and moreso for a musician.
It’s where you can make your ideas come together.
I also like to play pool. But what I like most is music.

– And the Marx brothers!
[says his son]
Yes, they’re brilliant [Juan laughs]

Flamenco is what keeps me
wanting to go on. You’re 45, a long career under
your belt, well-earned recognition, a family… Anything
you still want to accomplish?
Yes. I want to improve, if possible, become a
better dancer. Like I said before, there are dances
that haven’t been explored and I want to remove
the stigma for future generations. I can’t promise
I’ll be able to do it, but I’m going to
try.

Is there anything Juan Ramírez
would never do?
Dance without a shirt, or come out in sandals…things
like that.

Do you live or subsist through
flamenco?
You live from flamenco. Flamenco makes me feel things
I can’t get anywhere else. It makes me happy and
gives me pleasure. I think you can call that living.
In the monetary sense, there are many life-styles. There
are people who dance well or average, and make lots
of money. There are others who dance very well and don’t
make so much. It depends on each individual. I believe
that when a person is happy doing what he or she likes,
that’s living. Whether or not you win the lottery,
is another question.

It’s customary to dedicate
records to someone or include acknowledgements…who
would you dedicate this work to?
I have to thank my friend Juan Carlos, who made it possible
for this record to exist. And after that, it’s
for flamenco fans.

Who is Juan Ramírez
grateful to?
I say it in the song “Flamencos de Hollywood”
where I mention the artists of this country. It’s
a flamenco rap I improvised, it’s these people
we have to thank for being flamencos: Mairena, Camarón,
Caracol, Fernanda, Bernarda… We owe it all to them.

Photos: Rafael Manjavacas

More information:

Juan
Ramírez presents his first record, “Más
Flamenco que el Tacón».