Lockdown, time to nurture creativity.

'Maestros of Music' and 'Discover flamenco with Rafael'

Lockdown or 'confinement' as they call it here in France has been one of the toughest periods for the world in recent history. Seeing the suffering and numbers of deaths spiral out of control has been truly awful. It has been perhaps a period that will change the way we work or behave for the near future and beyond. For me and the entire creative industry, it has been disastrous. We are already hit by cuts, by free music online being streamed, often with no or virtually no rights on the music we record, forced to sign away our royalties etc etc. Where to go, what to do? I have no idea. We have to reinvent ourselves quite often and hope that will give us a way forward. Now us musicians have another problem. No live concerts for the time being, or at least in venues. Maybe we will go back to the fifties and the 'drive in' era. 

Anyway, in lockdown I have tried to keep busy and find a way to keep my creative brain turning over. I thought it would be a lovely idea to meet old friends, professionals and share our knowledge to the world, free of course. As I speak several languages, I have met up with musicians in France, Spain and the UK and more to come soon. Above, I meet up with flamenco harpist Ana Crismán, the only flamenco harpist in the world and we find out all about her and her unique way of performing flamenco music.

I have not only been performing flamenco all my life but also researching it too and it seems the perfect time to start to bring out some of the interesting ideas and musicians that are not always discovered. Please go to my youtube.com/flamencoguitarist to see more.

Stay safe and look after yourselves amigos.
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