TORONTO: The Gipsy Kings, a French band in the flamenco/rumba musical genre, are currently on their North American tour and graced us with their stop in Toronto (and in Vancouver earlier on in the week).
One of the greatest World Music bands who have made flamenco and gitana (gypsy) music popular around the globe (since 1978), still reign as kings in the hearts of millions. The original founding members are Tonino Baliardo, Nicolas and Andre Reyes and called the band Los Reyes. It consisted of many Reyes and Baliardo brothers and cousins.
The two original Kings, Nicolas and Tonino, are still together but alas, Nicolas was not on stage in Toronto. Tonino Baliardo and his family continue to promote their music and it certainly is flourishing. The Kings have had tremendous success with fifteen gold and platinum albums under their belt and have won a Latin Grammy Award for ‘Love and Liberté ’ (1993) for Best Pop Album of the Year. Their album ‘Savor Flamenco’ (2013) won a Grammy Award for Best World Music Album.
The Queen Elizabeth Theatre burst with the sound of flamenco guitars in full force on a rainy Friday night and make no mistake the crowds were ready to have a fiesta as the band played their first chords and called out “Toronto are you ready for the Gipsy fiesta?”
All the band members’ roots are strongly grounded in the gitana (gypsy) culture and continue to educate the international community in their music and ways. Anyone hearing them even for the first time cannot help but get pulled in by the pure emotion in their strong vocals and the chords of the Spanish flamenco guitar. The typicalgitana flamenco styles accompanied with classic tablero style rhythmic clapping and stomping of feet transport you straight to Andalucía (Southern Spain) the home of gitana flamenco.
The renditions of ‘Hablame – Como te Amo’, ‘Un Amor’, ‘Amor Mio – no volvera’ and ‘Amor de Una Mujer’, with strong gitana vocals hit high marks with the crowd, many of whom did not even understand the Spanish lyrics. And such is the universal language of flamenco music as performed by the Gipsy Kings.
The only thing missing were the Spanish Flamenco dancers with their feet stomping, flaring red skirts, and strong facial expression to complete the true tablero experience of the evening. But the bolder women fans easily outsmarted the security and rushed the stage to have their two minutes of fame and danced along with the band to entertain the crowds. In fact, there even was a small child who rushed up to hug and stay with one of the guitarists on stage as he was so mesmerized by the sound of the guitars!
The Kings performed their tribute song to California – their version of ‘Hotel California’ by the Eagles in Spanish/English much to the delight of the audience. They transitioned into more energetic flamenco/pop style songs like ‘Chiribi’, ‘Djobi Djoba’, ‘Vamos a Bailar’, and the crowds could not stop dancing. In fact, the Gipsy Kings played a straight 2-hour non-stop set and wowed the audience!
The setlist was pure vintage Gipsy Kings and they performed ‘Baila, Baila’ and ‘Bem, Bem, Bem Maria’, and the romantic number ‘Chica del Sol’ and engaged the fans in a dance frenzy!
No Gipsy Kings concert would be complete without their world famous ‘Volare’ and ‘Bamboleo’. The band encouraged fans to join in and singalong with them and take part in an interactive dance fiesta. And thus ended the grand Flamenco fiesta at the hands of the kings of our hearts and minds. The fans were satiated and got what they came for and more as the Gipsy Kings delivered and went beyond.
The audience started filing out of the venue with so many words of praise and most of them were in a trance; a sort of music coma enveloping their brains. I am sure that many of them being so pumped would continue the Spanish party elsewhere into the small hours of the morning! We would love to see the Kings’ next album fill us with wonder again sometime soon and wish them all the best for their travels!
ALSO BY NITA BALANI: A musical journey with Jesse Cook – the guitar man
