After the last album Andando El Tiempo, released in 2004, the long expected new album by Spanish guitarist and composer Gerardo Núñez saw the light of day under the label ACT.
Travesía is the name of the new record that tells the story of Gerardo’s African friends. The author says he got inspired by one Sunday afternoon at the beach in Spain.
While he was having a relaxing afternoon with his family, a rickety boat with anguished and starving illegal immigrants from Africa approached the beach. “They were people, who had left their sub-Saharan home countries in search of happiness and a better life. Coming to Europe was something like El Dorado for them”, Núñez explained. He became good friends with two of the immigrants from that boat, and started working with them on his projects later.
“Their story has something in common with flamenco”, he explained. The roots of flamenco lie in Andalusia where it developed from Mauritian, christian and Jewish influences. Like the immigrants cross the Mediterranean Sea in search of new homes, which will expose them to new influences, likewise do Núñez’s musicians cross musical borders of flamenco and accept different influences.
Núñez’s musical roots are established in flamenco, but this artist, who is considered one of the biggest flamenco virtuosos by many, is also known for his style crossings. The album Travesía is one more proof of his knowingly border crossing: his flamenco includes pop, funk, jazz and Latin sounds that freshen his extraordinary technique and great passion.
Beside his wife Carmen Cortéz, a famous flamenco dancer, and daughter Isabel who both join in with typical flamenco clapping and tapping, the album features saxophonist Perico Sambeat, pianist Albert Sanz and percussionist Cepillo who also coproduced the album.
*photo: Gerardo Núñez Flamenca Reunion at 14th Jazz Festu Sarajevo 2010 (by Zijah Gafić).