Does anybody know what Tirititrán means? The more I am paying attention to cante, I am hearing this word more often and just curious as to what it means.

Thanks!

half way through the video, when the singer starts, he sings that phrase.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxfwm9N1L_4

tran is my last name so it's kind of funny for me.

not sure what it means. just might be a "la la la dee la" type of thing.

ohjelo wrote:Does anybody know what Tirititrán means? The more I am paying attention to cante, I am hearing this word more often and just curious as to what it means.

Thanks!

As I understand it, it has no meaning per se. It is a vocalization that is a kind of introduction [to Alegrias I believe] and facilitates the establishment of the compas.

Doog

Hola

It is said that during an performance of the famous flamenco theatre "Calles de Cádiz", Ignacio Espeleta, who was acting the part of the blacksmith, had spent the night on a juerga and had a terrible hangover. When the moment came for him to sing alegrías, he could not rember the letras, so made something up. That something was tirititran which has come to be regarded as the traditional introduction to Alegrías de Cádiz.

Seán

Sean, thanks for the information about Espeleta. Similar to the "tirititran" intro to alegrias is the often-heard "ja ja" in the opening vocalizations for many/most siguiriyas. While one can sometimes hear a singer vocalize the "ja ja" while warming up for soleares, 95% of the time one hears it in siguiriyas.

Carlos

Interesting discovery! Thanks a lot!

Sean wrote:Hola

It is said that during an performance of the famous flamenco theatre "Calles de Cádiz", Ignacio Espeleta, who was acting the part of the blacksmith, had spent the night on a juerga and had a terrible hangover. When the moment came for him to sing alegrías, he could not rember the letras, so made something up. That something was tirititran which has come to be regarded as the traditional introduction to Alegrías de Cádiz.

Seán

Hey Sean,

Thanks for this information. It makes a lot of sense. It sounds like just what one would expect from a Flamenco.

Doog

It's very common in Spanish to vocalise rhythmic sounds. I used to have a Dominican friend who taught me a lot of salsa moves and he could vocalise all kinds of rhythms.

Listen to Latin American music and you can hear a greater variety of them than in Flamenco. But Flamenco has a few too.

First time I noticed it was in Dibujar una Rosa in the DVD for Sauras' Flamenco. In that song the cantaor opens with

Tiriti tran tran tran
Tiriti tran tran tran
Tarata tran tran tran tiriti
tran tran tran trae

I had assumed it was a good way for a cantaor to synch up with his accompanying tocaor as well as being a vocal warm-up equivalent of how every guitar solea/buleria has an opening before it breaks into the real solea/buleria format.
http://www.geocities.com/BourbonStreet/ ... track.html

Take a look at the lyrics from Sauras' Flamenco and like La puerta del principe, and see it's not uncommon to make up sounds like Jazz scats.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0Cr385OivQ

Chano Lobato explica