Free live music in Las Palmas, April 2021

I wish I went to more live music events this month but hey, three is already an improvement.

• 15 April: Fernando Lamadrid @ Teatro Guiniguada, Plaza F. Mesa de León, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria
  Timur and I went to Guiniguada to attend this masterclass. Well. If there is one thing that I learned there it’s how not to give a class. (Which, by the way, is useful as well, I just expected more than that.) Fernando is undubitably a great bass player and his technique and improvisations are incredible, but if you want to teach, you’ve got to prepare — like, to have some sort of plan maybe? The interaction with the audience was not going beyond “have you got any questions?”, invariably followed by stunned silence.

• 24 April: «Mujeres de carne y verso» @ Auditorio José Antonio Ramos, Parque Doramas
  Mujeres de carne y verso is a new album and a show by Juan Valderrama (yes, a son of that Juan Valderrama) based on women’s poetry throughout the ages. In this concert, postponed from 14 March 2020 (!), Valderrama was accompanied by a wonderful all-female band featuring Cary Rosa Varona (cello, double bass), Isabel Noa (piano), Mercedes Luján (guitar, tres cubano), Jessica Estévez (trumpet, cajón) and Madeline Espinosa (percussion). The highlights included Gracias a la Vida (salsa-style!), Hombres Necios, and, of course, “by popular demand” — in this case, the populus was represented by an elderly neighbour of mine who kept shouting the name of the song till Valderrama said “I think I heard you” — El emigrante.

• 29 April: Noa Drezner @ Museo Elder de la Ciencia y la Tecnología, Muelle de Santa Catalina
  As if to confirm my theory that women, as a rule, are better music teachers, this masterclass, indeed, was a class. Noa Drezner is an Israeli guitarist based in Jerez de la Frontera. She taught us several compases and made us to accompany her with hand clapping. And in the end there was an unexpected jam with another flamenco guitarist who happened to be in the audience.

  

Looking forward to May and return to normality in general.