URMENETA

March 26, 2010

Months ago I was looking for a gift for a special friend, trying to find something different but at the same time sharing with him some complicity. One day, without meaning to find that gift, I came upon the store, Kukuxumusu. I love these people! They have their proper identity and you can easily see it on their designs, opening themselves to the world without any kind of complexes. I walked in and just got carried away with their articles. After a while I found what I was looking for, a dark blue T-shirt with a wolf disguised as a bishop who is giving the absolution to a group of sheep, which no doubt will soon be added to the list of victims of the canine prelate. These days I have been in New York recording some of the songs that will be part of my next album “HERRIA” (Country). New York is an exciting city and in one of his main thoroughfare I met Mikel Urmeneta, Co-founder and Creative Director of Kukuxumusu. Interesting what life has prepared for one! These days beside Mikel have been really special. He has helped us out in everyway possible in our project, lively it as intensely as we do. Mikel is a passionate, active and energetic person. He took pictures, recorded videos, sharing everything we did on his blog, browsing through the studio, observing the musicians and singers who participated in the recording, in short terms, he was learning at every minute a world very different from his, but loving it. It is an incredible honor to share with someone like Urmeneta different experiences in a cosmopolitan city as New York. I had already visited before the Big Apple but this city is so incredible that there are always things to discover. Mikel has showed me a different view of the city and has shared with us all his energy and optimism. HERRIA sparkles with the magical potion of this incredible city and with the essences of a unique human being that mixed together can be explosive. We are leaving New York but knowing that we can count with a true friend who lives in this universal city in which we have become true ambassadors.

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PAJAROS DE PAPEL (BIRDS OF PAPER)

March 19, 2010

When you have a project in your hands it holds much of responsibility but also the dedication and effort of many others being the final result the pure talent of all. We were recording the song “Din Don – Din Don” for the album ETXEA and it was Emilio Aragón´s turn to sing. After the recording Emilio talk to me about his idea of directing a film in which the trikitixa was going to have an important role in the movie and invited me to participate in it. Last Friday, Emilio Aragón’s film “Pajaros de Papel “(Birds of Paper) debuted, a tender and touching tribute to all the comedians who lived the post-war years. Imanol Arias, Lluís Homar, Roger Princep and Carmen Machi are the leading actors who in an incredible way manage to convey so many unbelievable amounts of sensations. I am a passionate of the cinema and in addition of interpreting part of the soundtrack of the movie, totally composed by Emilio, himself, I also helped out giving my advice to Imanol, Lluís and Roger on how to play the trikitixa, where the fingers or the hands should be etc…to be able to live this close and be part of it has been a huge experience for me. While walking home I couldn’t stop thinking about that with all the technological advances we have today the feelings and the sensations that we sense when going on stage is not that far from those that lived 70 years ago, the trips, rehearsals, thinking about new shows, facing the live audience. So many memories come to my mind! You can tell that Emilio has lived all this since his childhood. With exquisiteness he narrates everything, nervousness, homesickness and the difficulties but also hope. This film is an adventure to discover our proper essences with the belief that one must always go forward whatever the circumstances are. Do not pass by without seeing “Pajaros de Papel”. The comedians await, the rehearsals have been long and life, sometimes sweet and sometimes bitter, continues behind the curtains of this story in which what there is, is what you see.

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PIZTIEN LAGUNA

March 12, 2010


Next Sunday, March 14, marks the 30th anniversary of the tragic plane crash in Shaktoolik, Alaska, on board, Felix Samuel Rodriguez de la Fuente, born precisely the 14th of March in Poza de la Sal, in the providence of Burgos and two of his colleagues, Theordore Roa and Alberto Marino. Isn’t strange how coincidence can occur sometimes in life. Many of the most cherished memories of my childhood are related in some way with music. Everything began on Friday night, after the mandatory news, suddenly you could fill the kitchen was over flooded with the first notes of the theme which was absolutely shocking; “El hombre y la Tierra “ (The man and the earth) was beginning. Rarely have I seen a melody so perfectly summarizes the essence of the serie to which it belongs. After the music of the maestro Antón García Abril images began appearing on screen and finally emerges the well known and admired voice of Dr. Felix Rodriguez de la Fuente. Very few know that “The friend of the animals” had a degree in medicine but instead he became a self taught naturalist and ethologist. A convinced falconer, Felix recovered the forgotten medieval art based on manuscripts and treaties of that period, which explains the basics in “capture the free with chained”. But what really launched him to fame was his television serie. Rodriguez de la Fuente, thanks to “El hombre y la Tierra “made us consent of something so forgotten by society back then, nature in our homes. Today, thanks to him, we all know what a dormouse is, the sound of the wolf’s howl or the meaning of the words “ecological pyramid” or “ecosystem”. Felix awoke in our society a new awareness that has been essential in protecting what we still have alive. When someone knows how to reach the public, manage, arrange and create something new and different, success is guaranteed, even above all criticism, that’s no miracle, it is just pure talent.


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HABANA SESSIONS

March 4, 2010

Many times the audience attending my performances tells me what most attracted them of my music are the strength, energy and freshness which they enjoy so much in my concerts. The magic of a live concert is something that I suppose one never learns how it comes upon. It exists, appears and suddenly wraps you up in its spell. It may probably be the result of many factors that come together at a particular point. From that view point came out the idea for the album HABANA SESSIONS the second part of the project FANDANGO whose first exponent was Provença Sessions, recorded with the string quartet Melonious Quartet. This CD, HABANA SESSIONS, is a compilation of 18 familiar themes with one unpublished song called “Maume”. The city of Havana, where the album was entirely recorded, a magical meeting, a spot surrounded by mystery, where you can senses that something special is about to happen, in every second. The atmosphere, the sunshine and the Cubans pushes you to empathize with the feelings of that place. There I met Rolando Luna, an excellent Cuban pianist who exemplifies like no one else the energy, pace and talent that the Cuban musicians treasure. Together, Rolando in front of his piano and I with my trikitixa without further details, have recorded, almost artisanal I would say, all 11 musical pieces for this album. Today we are blamed much that the music carries “deceits” technology thanks to all the computers and engineers, but HABANA SESSIONS is entirely the contrary. It is true that we could have tried to find another register, a new touch but I prefer to present it just as it was recorded in the studio, with that energy and complicity between Roland and I, which was occurring in the recording session, where sparks came out from our instruments, looking at each other, driven by the rhythm and the mutual feeling of the music. This CD is dedicated to all those who for years have been able to feel the emotions of my concerts. I really hope listening to this album, simple, intimate yet energetic you can feel something similar, proving once again that is in one self and in no one else where lies the desired magic of the music.
MILA ESKER! (THANK YOU)

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ZIURTASUNA

February 25, 2010

Today, many people are heading to this type of belief, which is enacted that each one makes their own reality, the same as, what one thinks and believes in somehow designs what may become their future. I do think in a way there is a point to it but the true of the matter is a little bit more complicated than all that. It is true that there are times in life that one without knowing why feels the absolute security that what he thinks and wants will become reality. Something like the famous phrase, “faith can move mountains” but adapted to the XXI century. I’m a big admirer of the trikitixa or the diatonic accordion and the tambourine playing simultaneously. It’s simple but very powerful but at the same time I harbour a dream of those so called “impossible”. Tomorrow, Friday at the Kursaal Palace in San Sebastian and to mark the 50th anniversary of the Basque Bank, Caja Laboral I will share stage with the Euskadi´s Symphony Orchestra and a few friends who will accompany me on this important event. To step on stage and to feel the orchestra behind you, stirs up mixed feelings, on one hand the huge responsibility it holds but also the perfect opportunity to live the music intensely, trying to break barriers and experience a dream that seldom becomes true in the career of a traditional musician. I want to thank Caja Laboral for their efforts and also for remembering the Euskadi´s Symphony Orchestra as for me in such an important day. When I started in this music, at that time in which the diatonic accordion was considered a “humble” instrument, not to say some else, little could I image that years later I would see myself on stage accompanied by the maestros of Euskadi´s Symphony Orchestra to play my composed music, arranged of course for this occasion. In life there are lessons to be learned and not to be forgotten. One important is that complexes and limits, contrary to popular belief, are not created by the circumstance but by oneself. The sooner we believe in this, the faster we will be able to reach our goals.

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