Diego el Cigala Interprets Tango

Posted on Sunday, November 13

Sunday night was juerga night at the Harris

By Debby Storms

Flamenco singer Diego el Cigala and his group held a juerga on November 6 at the Harris Theater for Music and Dance, and it rocked.

Or, I should say, it tangoed.

Juerga means “party” in Spanish, and el Cigala and his band had reason to celebrate:

Sunday night’s concert was the group’s final stop in their six-city U.S, tour, el Cigala’s first in this country. The tour was in promotion of his latest CD, “Cigala & Tango,” which has been nominated for a Latin Grammy and, judging from the reception the audience gave him last Sunday, the CD well deserves its nomination.

The CD is not the “flamenco puro” of his early career. Rather, it’s a deep dive into Argentinian tango, with which the singer became fascinated after spending time in Buenos Aires.

Though El Cigala had enjoyed a long career as one of Spain’s most highly regarded flamenco singers, in recent years he began exploring other forms of Latin music, notably Cuban (his 2003 collaboration with pianist Bebo Valdes, “Lagrimas Negras,” won a Latin Grammy and was considered by many critics as one of the finest CDs of that year).

On Sunday night, el Cigala and group covered many tracks from “Diego & Tango,” which was recorded in Buenos Aires’ famous Teatro Gran Rex with the additional backing of the venerable Argentinian artists Andrés Calamaro, Néstor Marconi and Juanjo Domínguez. Though they were not able to be present on the tour, we were lucky to have el Cigala’s regular musicians (most of whom also helped record the album) on stage: percussionist Sabú Porrina, pianist Jaime Calabuch “Jumitus,” violinist Bernardo Fernandez, Cuban bassist Yelsy Heredia, and (my favorite) the incredible guitarist Deigo del Morao.

Though lacking the traditional bandoneón (a type of concertina strongly associated with tango) on Sunday night, the music was still beautiful, with the flamenco tradition perhaps coming through more strongly as a result. With this tango project, El Cigala takes the music of Gardel, Ástor Piazzolla and Atahualpa Yupanqui, and, with his gritty flamenco voice, makes something new out of classic tango pieces such asTus ojos se cerraron and El día que me quieras and contemporary pieces like Garganta con arena.

All was not perfect. There seemed to be sound problems, and sometimes the music was a bit wobbly. I mentioned that the concert was like a juerga. In the spirit of “It’s our last night in the States, let’s party!” fun, El Cigala brought onstage with him a tall glass of something red that was decidedly not water. This glass was refilled a few times, and the other musicians, while not seen drinking on stage, could be seen doing so when they were offstage sitting out a song (but visible to those sitting in the first few rows).

Nothing wrong with having fun and relaxing – the audience did enthusiastically shout “Salud!” each time el Cigala took a drink – but at times, perhaps the result of being too relaxed, the musicians were not in synch with each other, and rhythms were not being caught from one solo to another. At other times, el Cigala would walk up to one or more of his musicians and shake a finger at them or otherwise indicate displeasure with something.

The most peculiar behavior I noticed happened when el Cigala announced that he would next sing an example of pure flamenco, a solea. Solea is known as the deepest, most profound palo (style) of flamenco. Guitarist del Morao, in the traditional way, began playing an introduction to the song with a series of gorgeous arpeggios, while el Cigala, who would typically have been paying attention to the guitarist in preparation for the mood of the singing, was instead interacting with someone offstage, waving and laughing and seemingly oblivious to both the audience and his guitarist. It was a sour note in what otherwise was a beautiful number.

Finishing out the concert was more lively material from his other recent CDs, including songs from various Latin American genres. The encore, a salsa number, was just loads of fun: All the musicians broke loose and cooked together until the stage was absolutely a-sizzle. They even did a little dancing in the traditional flamenco way … but to a very hot Latin beat.