It was called I Can Count to 12. Then I realised you'd only get that if you already got it. And no one would find me. If they'd have wanted to. So I've renamed it. Inspired by the Pacos who inspired me. It's still my flamenco journey. And it's still a slow journey.
I came from a place where music was everywhere. Every house had a guitar, or a piano, or even just a few pots to bang and a mouth organ. We'd sing the old songs, about the places our forefathers came from, and the new songs that now everyone in the world knows. Because I'm from Liverpool and our local heroes (amongst others) were The Beatles. I didn't know they were famous. They were just songs we sang about a world we were all familiar with, Penny Lane, girls called Jude, holes in Lancashire. At every party we went to, the instruments would come out, the beer would flow and the voices would be raised in harmony. So it's no surprise that I learnt to play guitar and sing a bit. And over the years I've played guitar and sang a lot. I was one of the blokes in the kitchen, dragging a people away from the main action at parties, creating a mass sing along to a Beatles classic, or REM, or Simon & Garfunkel. Beautiful, raucous, melodic drunken fun.
But then something happened that changed how I understood music: I saw Paco de Lucia play. And I realised I'd missed half the story, that music was this much bigger world. Because, like many people from my kind of background, I'd been listening in 4/4. And now I needed to learn to count to 12.
That's what this is about: my journey learning to count to 12. Because when you are brought up in a world of 4/4, flamenco is about 12. And flamenco is what I've become obsessed about. I'm two years in and I'm getting there. But. Very.Very. Slowly. I've signed up to it for life. One day I'll be a good flamenco guitarist. As it stands, I'm a very bad flamenco guitarist. But that's a start. At least you'd know it was flamenco. I’ll get there. Hopefully I’ve got years left. This is a collection of thoughts on that journey.
It's not about me, it's about flamenco and specifically flamenco guitar. I've played guitar for years, singing songs, having a laugh. Then I decided to learn to play it properly. I have a day job and other things I obsess about so it's not like I can dedicate my life to it. But I love it. And that's what this is about.
There's very little out there in the blogsphere about flamenco guitar. Which is wrong. My hope is to build a resource - in the loosest sense - for anyone who is into flamenco guitar. The tags give it some structure. For example, some of them fall under 'flamenco guitar lesson' and so they are the ones that cover theory or technique. But it's not just about learning. It's about inspiration, about the reality of learning, the experience and reflections of learning. At the very least it's helping me understand my flamenco. It might even help a few people. It might even inspire non-flamenco guitarists to try it. Go on...you know you should.
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