Interview with Son de la Frontera

Interview with

«Son de
la Frontera»

They’re from Morón de la Frontera. Son de, ‘They’re from”, la Frontera. The first sentence is a piece of information, the second is the name of one of the most surprising groups to appear in recent years. Five men – two musicians, two dancers and a singer – who see the past clearly reflected in the future, and the recipe has been tremendously successful. With two records on the market, they’re beginning to be known abroad, and back home, they have legions of admirers. With a sound that is both exotic and familiar, avant-garde and classic, they are one of a kind, and the members have a clear vision of the goals.

Everyone in the world of flamenco is familiar with your work, but it’s not easy to break out of the flamenco circle.
Raúl Rodríguez (RR): The tradition of Diego del Gastor isn’t involved with seeking a market, but with making music… the market will come later. We’re in no hurry, nor are we particularly ambitious, the most important thing is the music, and that’s what we concentrate on.

To a certain extent, you’ve become a cult group.
RR:Yes, people like what we do, and get involved in the music, that’s our greatest satisfaction, that there’s that kind of respect, but mostly because it fulfills our needs.

What does SDLF have that makes it different from any other group?
RR: There’s never been a tradition in flamenco of groups, of working as a team, and the collective feeling of belonging to a band, it tends not to be the case, and I think it’s a good thing for everyone that this kind of group can exist. I think that’s what most makes us different from others, in addition to the Cuban tres and the Morón sound, which is very special, whether it’s music from the 50’s, 60’s or 70’s, or contemporary music.

Raúl Rodríguez, Manuel Flores, Moi de Morón, Pepe Torres, Paco de Amparo

“The idea is not to lose the old music, which is where the sap and the living knowledge are still to be found.”

It’s a well-balanced group because there’s guitar, cante and dance.
Paco de Amparo (PA): There’s a little of everything, and each one gives the best he’s got, in knowledge, contributing ideas, backing one another up and working together.

You hold up the flamenco guitar work.
PA: And it’s plenty of responsibity.

You have to “fight” with the Cuban tres.
More than that, I have to “fight” with my buddy Raúl, who drives me nuts sometimes [laughter], but I think it’s a beautiful dialogue between the two instruments, and we really respect each other as people and as musicians, his ideas are put into operation, and mine as well, it’s a matter of joining feelings and each one’s contribution, be it dance, cante or guitar.

You’re a big group, five people, and that’s how you sell it, as a group of five, without leaders or bosses.How does the creative process work?
PA: Being mostly an instrumental group, each one brings his own ideas. Raúl contributes the concepts of his experience with Martirio, Kiko Veneno, Raimundo… And we try to get involved in that flow, just as he does with our Morón sound.

“We take it as far as we can, right up to what we consider the ‘frontera’, the frontier”

You live the Morón feeling from inside, and Raúl has had to study it from the outside in…
PA. The way we had to study Kiko Veneno and Raimundo, but in the composition process each one brings what he knows.

RR. It’s very interactive, and the dancers in the group like guitar very much, and they play guitar, the singer also plays, and we like dancing and singing, each in one way or another, we all influence each other mutually, it’s a very nice way to work, enjoying each other’s creativity.

Nevertheless, because of how unique it is, the Cuban tres is probably what most stands out as the star of the show.
RR. More than stand out, it’s the novelty of the sound, the novel concept of the instrument itself. There are things that when you read them through the instrument, they take on a different meaning.That might be what makes us different from the rest of the groups.

Raúl Rodríguez

How did the idea of the Cuban tres come about?
RR. I became familiar with Cuban music by way of the collaboration between traditional Cuban music and the flamenco of Seville, before the Buena Vista Social Club, Compay Segundo in his visits to Seville. This music began the conquest of Europe in Utrera, natural center of the world, along with Morón. Then it was the nineties, and in addition to Compay, Guayabero and many other Cuban artists, there was a lot of Cuban tradition that was unknown in Europe, and those of us who were in Seville experienced that moment, and saw it for the first time.I sensed that that instrument could be brought back into our own music. In Cuban tradition there’s a great deal of Andalusian immigrant influence, and the tres is probably a hybrid of Andalusian guitar and the form they gave it in Cuba, I think it must have had a previous relationship with flamenco. A sort of “ida y vuelta”, give and take.

“If you convince yourself you’re doing something surprising, there’s more possibility it’s going to make an impact on others”

What does dance contribute to an instrumental group?
Manuel Flores (MF): It’s with an eye to live performance, and it’s the flamenco ingredient we bring to the group as a sort of stage painting and motif for the music, because it reflects the compás and the cante – dance externalizes our feelings. Pepe is the real dancer, I do a kind of homemade thing, short and to the point, with a non-verbal language, each one does his own thing. Pepe’s footwork is included on the record, you don’t usually hear this, we think it’s important and necessary.

RR: There’s a lot of music in dancers’ feet, they’re extraordinary musicians. Pepe is a good guitarist, and a good singer too, and above all, he knows flamenco well, and what he brings to the group is absolutely fundamental. This isn’t really an instrumental group, I think it’s got the three elements, depending on which number, there might be more dance or more cante.

The review we published by Juan Vergillos he starts out saying “Avant-garde via a return to the origins”. Is there a need to recuperate the past?
RR:Our generation has a lot of responsibility in the sense that we are probably the last ones to have known the forms of how flamenco was done before its industrialization of the last20 or 30 years, and we’re going to be the last ones to have known certain ways of singing, playing and dancing as they were done in formative years that were crucial.After a time, coming generations won’t have access to this, so ours has a divine responsibility in that respect, a transitional generation, we have the need and the responsibility to convey something which is still totally alive so that in 30 or 40 years people can enjoy those sounds and they aren’t lost.By the same token, I often think the map of the future was drawn in the past.

How is that music updated for today’s taste?
PA: By each one putting his grain of sand as a musician, whether it’s elements of Diego del Gastor, Ramón Montoya or Sabicas, and to the best of our abilities, but the idea is not to lose the old music, which is where the sap and the living knowledge are still to be found.

Son de la Frontera’s first recording came as a surprise to everyone, the way you made use of Diego del Gastor. Was it more difficult to surprise in this second record?
MF: It was a challenge. Trying to keep up the same dialogue we initiated on the first record, in the same line and without any brusque changes, that was the challenge we took on, and I think we managed to pull it off, but it was very difficult, it’s hard to improve on a good thing.

And to surprise people the second time around is even more complicated.
RR. The best way to surprise people is by surprising ourselves and being excited about what we do. And if it’s new for us, it’ll also be new for audiences.

Within the continuity of the SDLF sound, what is there new in “Cal”?
There are new compositions, the “Soleá del Amor”, “Tanguillos de la Frontera”, “Bulería en Rama”, which is Paco’s, a bulería made of bits and pieces taken from Cuban music which opens the record… We take it as far as we can, right up to what we consider the “frontera”, the frontier. Creative freedom is born from respect for tradition, playing within those confines, trying not to lose anything and pick up new music along the way.

On the one hand, you do Diego del Gastor’s music, but then also Enrique el Mellizo’s, and some of your own themes.
RR: Well, of Enrique el Mellizo, it’s the malagueña, and then there’s the guitar arrangements for taranto and sevillanas of Antonio Amaya “El Mellizo”, who was Diego’s brother.

PA: We have our own things, aside from drawing on those who went before, those incredible guitarists, we have our own ideas, and we add our compositions, arrangements we put together and which we like, that’s the basic idea. If you convince yourself you’re doing something surprising, there’s more possibility it’s going to make an impact on others.

Is it enough with Diego del Gastor’s music, or are you seeking new paths?
RR: Music is amazing, and in Morón there’s plenty of it.Diego’s, as far as I can see, is endless, not that we mean to champion one thing or another, but we take inspiration from whatever triggers our emotional response.

PA: It’s what we’ve grown up with, that way of playing is very perssonal and special, from a specific house in a specific town, just like Jerez has its own sound, Lebrija, its own identity, or Utrera, its special way with the cante. We’re not trying to exploit Diego’s music, we do what we do with great respect and care, it’s what we grew up with.

What do people in Morón have to say?
PA: In actual fact, I think it’s the first time in many years that the town’s flamenco followers have all come together in full support of something to come out of our town.When we were at the Bienal they mobilized two tour buses to bring people up from Morón, young and old, and it was very well-received.

The record was going to be called “El Sonido de la Cal”.
RR: The original idea was to call it “Cal” (the whitewash mined outside town), but then we looked at other possibilities, and in the end we went back to the first idea.We want to underline the concept of tradition, Morón was making whitewash as far back as the eighteenth century, it became a very strong tradition: they mined it in the mountains, lovingly baked it until the stone cracked, just to make that liquid which is painted, like flamenco itself, layer upon layer. It’s the idea of remembering where we come from and knowing who we are in order to be able to make this known to the world.

How are you received abroad?
PA: Very very well, really…

Do you find that people know who you are?
MF: Very often I’ve been surprised how well they know us, the majority know what they’re going to see, thanks to the media, and Internet, most flamenco fans know what to expect from us.

SDLF has yet to received a bad review.
RR: And let’s hope it continues like that, but each person is free to have his or her own opinion, there’s no accounting for tastes, we do what we do with respect and love.

 It was Americans who discovered Diego del Gastor and made him known in the U.S.Do you have any idea of how your music is viewed over there?
RR and PA: When we were playing in New York we were with Steve Kahn, in Chicago with former students of Diego and they had a great time, apparently they were very moved. Our first record was published there, and the second is going to be as well.

RR: The Americans who went to Morón during those years really liked Diego a lot and recorded many things. They enjoyed the music, and then went home and spread what they had learned, these people are really crazy about Diego, and so are we, there’s a common thread.

Are you considering exploring other kinds of music that might have an affinity, such as Arabic, Indian…?
PA: In the very nature of the Cuban tres there are Arabic and Hindu sounds, I think it’s there already, that’s the mystery of this instrument. With guitar, and the scales, it can sound Indian, Arabic, Greek…

MF: It’s a question of time, as we go along, we’ll pick up whatever seems valid at a given moment. We’re very open to all kinds of music, but always respectful of the roots.

RR: Like the poet said, we’re looking heavenwards, but with our feet on the ground.

You’ve received quite a few prizes, and the critics all seem to be in agreement, just like our readers who voted at Deflamenco.
PA:We’ve got enough to start a decent collection… but the most important thing is having your work appreciated, that’s very rewarding and gives you the urge to keep moving forward, recognition of the collective work of five people.

Reseña disco 'Cal'
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