Day Two: Workshop Flamenco Edsart Udo de Haes
Trying to find the location of this workshop, I found out that the Bunker -the Artez Conservatory building- has something of a labyrinth. I walked up and down the corridor in the vicinity three times before I found the the narrow passage to the classrom where the Flamenco workshop was held.
I got acquainted with two aspects of the Flamenco, the quintuplet tremolo and the rasgueado. These techniques showed me to which extent I am "locked" in the classical style.
The "classical" p-a-m-i tremolo (like the one in Recuerdos de la Alhambra) is an "even" movement. A quintuplet on the other hand is an "odd" movement (yes, it feels odd too!) which has an innate irregularity which is quite difficult to practice if you are used to "four sixteenth note" tremolos. I did not succeed very well.
Rasgueado is a technique in its own right. In the "classical mode", you mostly play with an inward movement of the right hand fingers, the flamenco rasgueado is just the other way round. An excellent exercise to train your muscles both ways, but it turned out to be no skill of mine at the moment.
Well, it was great fun to have a taste of Flamenco, despite the fact that I got some nail damage as a consequence of the rasgueado. Now I understand why Edsart Udo de Haes had reinforced his nails with heavy acrylics. If you don't, you'll rip off your nails with the first Solea!