The word "folklore", in conjunction with Spain, conjures up immediately its primary expression, Flamenco. This is rightfully so, since the folk-poems, dancing and music that are Flamenco are among the few folk expressions in the West that can still be found in a relatively pure state.
The application of the term, Flamenco, to the folk-music and dance of Andalucia, may have its origin in the Spanish Golden Age, when the colorful outfits and extravagant ways of the Flemish Courtiers in Spain led to the word being applied to anything somewhat outlandish.
The music and the forms seem to have risen out of Arabic, Jewish and Gypsy Cultures in the southwest of Spain, and especially around Perez, where it is today so closely associated with the famous local wines and bull-ranching. Still today, if the tourist wishes to hear the best spontaneous Flamenco he would do well to spend time in this area, especially around Fiesta time. Other centers are in Sevilla and Codoba.
Flamenco has much in common with one of the other folk forms of the West, the Afro-American "blues". Both are serious and very personal; both speak mainly of love and its problems; both ideally take place as a communication between a single singer and a group of friends; both are associated with the guitar and with drinking, and both feature short, unsophisticated stanzas, which need not always be connected.
The best singers of Flamenco in Spain today are almost invariably Gypsies. They usually begin their plaintive songs with a long, guttural sound sung at the loudest possible volume. Then they will launch off with a lyric such as, "l obey all the ten commandments / but I'm only lying", or the more typical, "You treated me like your doll and threw me away / now you look in the mirror, and don't you look fine".
Until about the mid-nineteenth century Flamenco was uncommercialized and existed among the ordinary people of Spain as a property solely their own. According to one account Flamenco was first performed as an entertainment in Malaga, around 1850. The cafe or "tablao" was quite simple, with mirrors, wooden tables and a small wood stage. Today's Flamenco cafes have maintained the idea of simplicity. They are kept small, but the decoration has changed to paintings of Flamenco dancers, generally with a very large painting on the wall of the stage. Red lighting is often employed.
There is no reason to feel, as you may have read elsewhere, that it is impossible to hear good Flamenco on stage. As with good "blues" there are nights when the performer is feeling right, the audience is involved, and a good performance does result. Since those performers who make a living at it are generally among the best, the chances of a good performance are not so slim after all. The bad reputation of stage Flamenco comes from the large, concert hall productions, which are invariably awful, and from the cafes that have bent over backwards to satisfy tourists. This means only that you must be somewhat selective.
An evening of cafe Flamenco will consist of several acts. One may be a single, usually older woman singing to the accompaniment of handclapping and a single guitar, playing little more than a few chords. In another act the entire troupe will sit is a quarter-circle clapping very complex rhythms while the young women take turns dancing. Then perhaps the lights will be dimmed, a solitary Gypsy will come out on the stage to sing a few couplets; a solitary woman of great beauty, dressed in the colorful Andalucian costume will dance with graceful. sensuous movements of the arms, shoulders and neck while maintaining the dramatic stiffness of a torero in her back. She and the Gypsy will form a duo, she dancing closer to him until finally she is within the semi-circle formed by his extended arms as he sends out his Oriental wails of poetry. At the end, never touching, they will go offstage together.
Added to these are many other variations, often new and unexpected, as Flamenco is an open form and becomes influenced by South American and other rhythms.
Any list of recommended Flamenco cafes should not be taken too seriously, since the performers are changed often and the quality can vary tremendously between the time a list is being made and the time you read it.