Andalusian Music: History, Forms, Instruments, and Flamenco
Andalusian Music
Andalusian music arose in the southern peninsula during the Muslim Epoka. It is a mixture of Jewish, Arab, and Berber musical traditions. It is both vocal and instrumental, featuring instruments such as the Arabic lute, lyre, and tambourine.
Musical Forms
The song is the most used musical form, which is the alternation between Strofada and Stribillo. In popular music, the verse is called a proverb. Romances are instructed in four categories:
- Horn: Bellows pipes, a three-hole flute (played with one hand, leaving the other hand free for a tamboril, a drum or percussion instrument, very widespread in the peninsula), and the flageolet.
- Membranophones: Tambourine and drum (widely spread throughout the peninsula, it was also called tambor, tamborin, or tabal. There is an impressive display of popular tambores in Calanda).
- Idiophones: Mortars, cowbells, sherds, washing tables, anise bottles, and castañuelas (associated with the Andalusian tradition, present in the innermost regions. Each pair of castanets has a different timbre; the one played with the left hand marks the timing, and the one played with the right hand has a sharper sound, used for repikes).
- Chordophones: Guitar, timple, the rebec (most often played with a bow, although sometimes with a plectrum), the hurdy-gurdy (which consists of a small wheel that rotates through a crank, causing the strings to vibrate), and the salterio (six strings struck by a small mace).
Work Songs
This is the genre with the most variants: songs of harvest, sowing, carriers, plowing, harvest, millers, mining (sung in mines), and pile (sung in forges).
Musical Ensembles
The most well-known are the rondallas, consisting of guitars, mandolins, lutes, and tambourines. Groups of tambourines are found in the north of Galicia and Castile. Sets of bagpipes are found in Asturias and Galicia. In Andalusia, choirs, campanilleros of Seville, and verdiales are important. Carnival groups are common in many villages and towns (such as those in Cadiz and Cruz de Tenerife).
The Mysteries
These are theatrical plays that show a passage related to the Bible or religion. The most well-known mystery is that of Elche, Spain, which is represented every year on the day of the Virgin of the Assumption. It contains arias, duets, trios, and choruses.
Flamenco
The styles in flamenco are called palos. One palo is distinguished from another by the specific way the guitar plays the Andalusian cadence and the rhythmic air with which the stanzas are sung. The text of the stanzas adopts different meters depending on the palo.
Analog Sound
A graph of an analog sound curve shows its vibration.
Digital Sound
Approximations of analog sound are realized through numerical information.
CD
A small 12-centimeter diameter disk whose surface records digital information in the form of microscopic samples that are read by a laser beam. The length of the CD allowed many classical works to be edited as a single disk and could be listened to without interruption. The appearance of the CD notably increased sales of records. Many recordings were put back into production, giving record labels the opportunity to raise prices.
MIDI System
With the digitalization of sound, numerous digital devices and keyboards were produced. However, a problem arose: two devices of different brands could not be connected. Therefore, it was agreed to unify the computer codes so that two or more modules could be handled simultaneously. This led to the creation of the MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) connection system.
MP3
A digital format in which music is compressed by eliminating frequencies that are theoretically undetectable to the human ear. An MP3 file is 10 times smaller than a CD audio file. The different qualities are measured according to the number of kilobytes per second; the more kilobytes per second, the higher the quality of the MP3 file. The MP3 had immediate success due to the advantages it offered.
Music Traffic
It is very difficult to quantify. Thousands of rock and pop songs are downloaded daily around the world. This represents a high volume of illegal use of music, whose solution and regulation are very complicated. The MP3 has caused the biggest crisis in the history of the recording industry, as people are less inclined to buy discs.