One thing Mayte, your last names…what’s the origin?
Well, I’m a mixed bag. My parents were from Catalonia and Málaga, my grandparents were from Murcia and Asturias…my father’s side is Andalusian, but on my mother’s there was a little of everything. “Cadiemo” is a last name I haven’t seen anywhere outside of my family.
The reason I ask, is because of your background…to see who’s to blame.
I think my love of flamenco comes from my love of music in general. The thing is, it was the first music that caught my attention. The first thing that got me hooked was flamenco. It made me feel emotions and cry, it made me want to sing.
Who was singing?
Marchena, Valderrama, la Niña de la Puebla. Flamenco in the earlier lyrical line.
They’re the ones who led to the great stylistic debate.
I don’t mean to say there aren’t two kinds of flamenco. There are, and there always have been. And they’re perfectly differentiated. What’s absurd is to establish a differentiation of quality. That’s crazy. The style or form of things has nothing to do with that. Marchena was flamenco and so was Caracol. Each one had his own story. The same thing with Manuel Torre and Chacón.
But look, when I started out I can tell you I discovered flamenco thanks to Valderrama, but it felt like something was missing, and after a time I understood. I loved that cante, but needed…how can I say it?…something more funky, more visceral…so I went searching. My brother Paco helped me, in those days he was accompanying me on guitar. Together we investigated and came upon Agujetas, Chocolate, Caracol…in other words, everything that was missing. That was the other side of the coin, but don’t think they were country bumpkins, what they were doing was plenty sophisticated in its own way.
But then, later on, I discovered la Niña de los Peines, and that’s where I saw there was someone who brought everything together, from my point of ear, she did everything and made it one. That was Pastora Pavón.
“The end result mustn’t be a concern. It’s the journey that matters, and how you feel about yourself. The fruits of your labor will come later on, first plant the tree and care for it, and that tree is your truth. If it isn’t your truth, what difference does it make if it bears fruit or not, or how big and lush it becomes?”
How old were you when that happened?
I was 19. Had I discovered her earlier, I would have taken that step much sooner. It was a kind of love affair, like when you meet the person you identify with. That “mirror” as so many people call it. In her I found what I considered flamenco to be.
Flamenco is elegant phrasing with a gutsy quality, and risking everything at each moment.
That certainly comes through in what you do.
That’s important. Hard work and experience help you improve and express yourself better, but make no mistake, the main thing is to be free. If I couldn’t be free on stage, I assure you I wouldn’t be in this line of work. I can’t conceive of it.
Well, many performing artists are pressured by the record companies…deadlines, collaborations, promotion…sometimes they miss being completely free, or so it seems at least.
That’s a consequence of the world we live in, but it cannot be a priority. I’d like to be rich and famous, but that can’t be my priority. It’s immoral for an artist to think like that…anyone who does is unworthy of being called an artist. Art exists in order to be free, to release things that can’t be felt or done in day-to-day life. It’s the sublimation of emotion, know what I mean?
I think only two things take you to that point: love and art. That is what liberates you and shows you who you are, it gets things out of you that you didn’t know were inside.
If anything limits you, that can’t be. You can’t be pressured because something you do isn’t commercial, or worrying about pleasing people because you’re insecure…none of that matters, you can’t go on stage like that. The end result mustn’t be a concern. It’s the journey that matters, and how you feel about yourself. The fruits of your labor will come later on, first plant the tree and care for it, and that tree is your truth. If it isn’t your truth, what difference does it make if it bears fruit or not, or how big and lush it becomes?