Juan Manuel Canizares is technically one of the best guitarists that have ever lived. He is a contemporary and a colleague of Paco de Lucia, and technically even superior then the Maestro in some ways…
Somehow, I wasn’t drawn into his playing straight away, but over the years his art reached my heart, and I started enjoying his performances just as in any other guitarist’s playing, (like Gerardo or Vicente…).
He was very famous for bending the strings like they are made of metal, like electric guitar players, or “the electricians”, as we like to call them… 🙂
Juan Manuel Canizares was born in Sabadell in 1966. His family is from Andalusia. He moved from Sabadell to Barcelona during the era of fascism. Being one of the most important and influential flamenco artists, he had a career that spans more than four decades. He was the first flamenco artist to be invited to perform with the Berlin Philharmonic. He performed the Concierto de Aranjuez under the direction of Sir Simon Rattle at the Teatro Real in Madrid. Juan Manuel Canizares has also won the prestigious National Guitar Award (1982), Music Award (2008), and Flamenco Hoy (2000, 2011, and 2013).
Juan Manuel Canizares had a close relationship with Paco de Lucía for many years. But also with numerous great artists and creators such as Enrique Morente, Camarón de la Isla, Alejandro Sanz, Peter Gabriel and Leo Brouwer, etc…
To be 100% honest with you – I never bought a CD from him. I don’t know why, maybe because it was an era of copying the discs like crazy, the 90s… But I sure did buy MANY CD’es by Paco De Lucia…? – Explain that…? I surely can’t… It is just some respect, that an artist gains with you when you get to know him, I guess… I have no other explication. I guess that his songs were just not “as calling” to me as Paco’s or Vicente’s were… Or something else might be at stake, I can’t tell, although I thought of it a lot while I am writing this post…
This rumba called “Lluvia de cometas” (rain of comets) is so native flamenco that it almost sounds like some ternary, (not binary) music piece. There is a studio version of it and there is also a live version I found on YouTube. I apologize because I sound like some novice, or like somebody that just found out about this guitarist. It just sounds like that, because I know of this man, or better put – this tremendous artist for many many years… (never had a chance to meet him in person, though). Now, why it didn’t seem so damn good to me then – I just do not know, I guess I was just young and stupid…! Stupid enough not to appreciate all that this guy did, which is immense, really…
Here is a live version of the same song:
Admire and enjoy…