Son De La Frontera

From the Hornsey and Crouch End Journal, on the Barbican show:

“The double bill at the Barbican was packed and the double encore testament to the quality of this gig. Son de la Frontera (Sound of the Frontier) is a flamenco band with a twist. Band leader Raúl Rodriguez pairs his Cuban tres-guitar with flamenco-guitar to bring a Latin American element to the more traditional sound.

Whether dueting or being accompanied by Moi de Moron on vocals and other members on compas, this band’s mesmerising rhythms make flamenco seem fresh and exciting. After the high of Son de la Frontera’s set, Mayra Andrade’s low key West African beats seemed rather uninspiring.”- Jo Caird

Tim Cummings praises Son de la Frontera at the Barbican in The Independent UK, giving the show 4 stars:

“She last appeared in London supporting Angélique Kidjo at the Barbican in the autumn. Six months on and Mayra Andrade has been nominated for a Radio 3 Award for World Music and returned to the Barbican, this time heading a double bill with flamenco group Son de la Frontera. So it was ironic that this triumphant return was almost blown away by the passion of Son de la Frontera’s opening set.

Guitarists Paco De Amparo and Raul Rodriguez, on the double-stringed Cuban tres guitar, flank the dancer Pepe Torres, hand percussionist Manuel Flore, and singer Moi de Moron.

The delicate tones of the tres spiral through flamenco’s falsetas – the scales and arpeggios that are its equivalent to jazz riffs – and the precision playing between the two is as breathtaking as the complex rhythms they keep on the boil.

Vocalist Moi starts with an impassioned buleria. On “Solea de Pepe”, the young dancer Torres returns to perform a blistering 10-minute dance that earns huge applause. Pure flamenco, muy macho.”

The Financial Times‘ Mark Espiner praises Son de la Frontera’s set at the Barbican.

“Late last year, Mayra Andrade’s debut album had just been released and she was playing the support slot for the Benin singer Angelique Kidjo at the Barbican. Then, with a confident set, she practically sang her off the stage. Six months on she has a nomination for best newcomer in the BBC Radio 3 World Music Awards, is the headline act and has sold out the venue. This time her support band, Son De La Frontera (Sound of the Frontier) - also nominated for an award in the Europe category - threatened to do to her what she had done to Kidjo.

This five-piece band from Spain are aptly named; their music pushes at the borders of traditional styles with a daring mix of traditional Flamenco and Latin American sounds. As band leader Raúl Rodríguez said: “We offer you the best of our tradition and the best of our creation.” It was an offer the audience liked, rewarding a marvellous duet that set Rodríguez’s clean-picked Cuban tres guitar against Paco de Amparo’s frantic Spanish strumming with a standing ovation. Unusual for a supporting act.”

Read the full article at Sequenza21.

“Flamenco provides one of the rawest, purest, and most sophisticated musico-dramatic experiences on the planet.  And the 6-member Son De La Frontera, presented by The Bay Area Flamenco Partnership at The Yerba Buena Center for The Arts Theater Saturday 1 March, are masters of this ancient form…Son De La Frontera delivered it clearly, honestly,and without regret. Virgil Thomson once declared that composers did everything but speak the language of the heart. But these Spaniards, who paid tribute to composer-guitarist Diego Del Gastor (1908-1973) here, certainly did. And their music, which comes from Del Gastor’s, made the divided chambers of the heart visceral, and incredibly real.

…Del Gastor’s was ripe with subtle yet powerful touches and myriad colors, like a dream of Spain’s fairest flower. Things got obviously more intense when guitarists Raul Rodriguez and Paco De Amparo took the stage with singer Moi De Moron, and the compas, or rhythm section provided by him — handclapping on the palmas, or the sordas — and Manuel Flores, and Pepe Torres, who also danced. Rodriquez and De Amparo’s unisons and solos were a harmonic and coloristic anchor to the intricate polyrhythms of the other three musicians, especially the phenomenally fancy footwork, or taconero, by Torres, who had  tons of that essential flamenco ingredient, duende, and whose turning, lurching, and jumping was powerfully controlled, the scarlet back of his black vest the only note of color in the show….

…The group also gave knockout performances of the fiesta, cantina, sevillana…And I was reminded of the late great Spanish mezzo Rocio Jurado, who sang on the soundtrack of Carlos Saura’s 1985 film of De Falla’s El Amor Brujo, when listening to Moi de Moron. You don’t have to know or even “hear”  the words to feel whats he’s saying. It doesn’t get any better, or more real than this.” - Michael McDonagh

Son de la Frontera is featured this week on Cyloop, the social networking site for Latin artists and fans, by Hoodiny. Click here to see the group’s Cyloop profile; click the banner to see the feature on the homepage.

Wonderful review by Sarah Bardeen on Rhapsody about the San Francisco show last Saturday:

Photo by Heather Sarantis

“When Spanish flamenco sensations Son de la Frontera came to San Francisco on Saturday, March 1, the hip, educated Bay Area audience thought it was ready. There’d been a stellar article about the rough rural outpost, Morón de la Frontera, where most of the band members come from and the region’s passionate, raw music. The show opened with a video clip of the band’s inspiration, guitarist Diego del Gastor, and his vocal collaborator La Fernanda de Utrera. The Bay Area Flamenco Partnership even gave not one but two introductions before the show started. But nothing could prepare the crowd for what they would experience over the next hour and a half: a live show so stunning it defied all classification.

Reviewers might be given to hyperbole when discussing Son de la Frontera, but it’s for good reason. The show opened acoustically — no mics, no instruments, just five guys in black suits and black shirts standing before a teeming, sold-out concert hall. Singer Moi de Morón, an unassuming man, opened his mouth and let out an ungodly wail — a lament so deep, so gruff, so ancient that it sent shivers through the crowd. A peppering of “ole”s burst from the flamenco aficionados in the audience, as if against their will: they sounded as if they’d been struck in the gut. When Moi was done singing, dancer Pepe Torres, whose grandfather was the noted Gypsy dancer Joselero, stepped forward and began to knock his shoes against the board below him. It was the first of many breathtaking dance (or baile) sessions — and just a taste of what was to come….

At one point, Torres took such a long baile solo that the audience broke in with rapturous applause and ovations three times before it ended. He strode off the stage, leaving the crowd in a frenzy, and the band wisely kicked into a well-mannered bulería that gave the audience a chance to cool down and collect themselves…

The show ended with a hilarious dance by Manuel Flores, whose playful moves echoed spontaneous pueblo dances done by drunk uncles, and a guest appearance by Juan del Gastor, Diego’s nephew. Again the group left their microphones behind, performing with nothing between themselves and the audience, while del Gastor sang with the drama and humor of a true veteran. When the lights went up, the crowd let out a mighty exhalation and went out, very reluctantly, into the night.”

You can read the show preview for Son de la Frontera’s Echoplex show (2/28) in the Los Angeles Times here, as well as a New York blogger’s review of the last Saturday’s Skirball Center show here.

From the L.A. Times:

“Both of Son de la Frontera’s CDs open with the most basic human percussion: stamping feet and clapping hands. Then a guitar comes in, blending with a Cuban tres, and finally a voice that sounds like the Spanish equivalent of an old blues singer.

The idea, he says, is not to be locked into a tradition but to appreciate that tradition.”

Carl Nagin writes about the influence of Diego del Gastor and the Morón de la Frontera flamenco sound in the Bay Area, leading up to Son de la Frontera’s anticipated concert on March 1st in San Francisco.

“The concert that has generated the most buzz for Bay Area flamencos happens Saturday at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, where one of Spain’s hottest and most innovative new flamenco ensembles, Son de la Frontera, makes its Bay Area debut with Juan del Gastor as guest artist. The group’s artistic focus has been a revival of Diego’s music. Jackson Browne, a longtime flamenco enthusiast, calls them “the best new group I’ve heard in any genre. A riveting tribute to the seminal flamenco master Diego del Gastor, the CD embraces the tradition of flamenco puro and succeeds in making it new.”

Son de la Frontera is a fusion group, one of whose innovations is the addition of a non-flamenco instrument, the Cuban tres, as part of their homage and exploration of Diego’s music.

Four members of the Son de la Frontera quintet have Morón in their blood: two were born there, and two are grand-nephews of Diego, including 30-year old dancer Pepe Torres, whom Serva first introduced to Bay Area audiences in 2003, before the group was launched….

Musicality is one feature of what Serva praises as the accessibility of Son de la Frontera, whose popularity began outside Spain as a world music group performing Diego’s flamenco riffs far from the source - in Mexico, Cuba, South America and northern Europe.

“Their popularity doesn’t relate to anything that’s going on in Spain now,” says Serva. “They’re not a bunch of people trying to be super hip or super complicated. The most salient feature of their music is its clarity.”

Singer Nina Menendez sees their use of Diego’s music as something that transcends slavish copying: “Flamenco is an oral tradition. You can’t write it down. Diego never played the same way twice. His falsetas, his toque (playing) were a framework for improvisation. And that was part of the musical culture in Morón. That’s a big difference between so-called “modern” and so-called “traditional” flamenco. Modern flamenco takes on some abstract ideal of music: whether it’s a young, perfect body type for a dancer, or overly choreographed performances, or the technical virtuosity of the guitar, with complex harmonies and dazzling riffs. Traditional flamenco, on the other hand, is more about cultural identity, an expression of family, community. It’s a legacy, a shared frame of reference.” At Son de la Frontera’s Yerba Buena show, a flamenco legacy of three generations will be onstage when guitarist and singer Juan del Gastor performs with them.

“Even though they never met Diego, his spirit lives in their hearts,” says Juan del Gastor.”

Full article here.

Son de la Frontera is featured in Ciudad Magazine for the Los Angeles show:

“At a time when Spanish flavor is invading the fine dining world and changing the way people eat (the tapas trend has influenced the return of Italian and even Japanese “small plates”), we’d expect Spanish music to be making a comeback not experienced since the heyday of the Gypsy Kings. Well, there is an act out there with a world-renowned, accoustic-guitar-driven sound: Son de la Frontera is a Grammy-nominated flamenco troupe that has caught the attention of Jackson Browne and Ozomatli’s Raul Pacheco and Ulises Bella, who are “introducing” the group to L.A. with a show in a couple weeks.

The Son de la Frontera sound is said to blend traditional flamenco (gypsy and North African flavors) with Spanish and Caribbean influences. Guitar work is inflused with ornate, almost-regal bravura, while vocals are emotional and harrowing. The troupe’s founder, Raul Rodriguez, was so taken by the music of the late Diego Amaya Flores del Gastor that he made a pilgrimage to Flores’ hometown of Maron de la Frontera. There he connected with fellow Flores acolytes Paco de Amparo and Pepe Torres. With Moi de Moron and Manuel Flores joining on, Rodriguez had an A-list flamenco band on his hands. This year Son de la Frontera is up for a BBC World Music Award, to be announced in April.

Catch Son de la Frontera Thursday, February 28 at The Echoplex, 1154 Glendale Blvd., Echo Park. Tickets $25. Info: attheecho.com.”

“Next weekend, the innovative flamenco fusion ensemble Son de la Frontera performs at NYU’s Skirball Center.

The quintet’s distinctive sound stems from bandleader Raúl Rodríguez’s Cuban tres — a three-string guitar — and other Latin American influences.

‘There are many artists who are working with Andalusian and Caribbean music’s common heritage,’ Rodríguez says. ‘We love to investigate the common links and we try to adapt them as best as we can.’

The festival, which started in 2001, has turned the city into a magnet for top flamenco acts.

‘We are seeing that, in New York, they are doing a great job of showing all audiences the flamenco world from within,’ says Rodríguez. ‘In all its essence.’” - Carlos Rodriguez Martorell

Read the whole article here.