What's New
•Tab: Alegria falseta (4/8)
•Articles: Soleá Accompaniment (1/16)
•Tab: Soleá por Baile (1/16)
•Toque: The End of an Era (12/23)
•Toque: Manchego! (11/1)
Quick Links
Recent Articles
•Soleá Accompaniment
•Practice Tips for Beginners
•Free Tab on the Internet
•Alegrias Accompaniment
•Foot Tapping for Bulerías
•Returning to A [book review]
•Palmas in Brief
•Sevillanas Accompaniment
Recent Tabs
•Alegria falseta
•Soleá por Baile
•Bulerías falseta
•Tangos falseta
•Sevillana (E min)
•Alegrias por Baile
•Almoraima (bulerías)
Metronomes
•Metronome
Demo
•Alegrías
(120 bpm)
•Alegrías
(144 bpm)
•Bulerías
(180 bpm)
•Bulerías
(200 bpm)
•Rumba
(180 bpm)
•Rumba
(200 bpm)
•Sevillanas
(120 bpm)
•Sevillanas
(135 bpm)
•Siguiriya
(144 bpm)
•Soleá
(90 bpm)
•Tangos
(120 bpm)
•Tangos
(144 bpm)
Support RF !
I have a tendency to include references, appositions, and other errata in my text as I write. As I realize that not everyone cares for such digressions, however, I generally "hide" them in scripts. To access this "additional information," just click on the boldfaced text. To expand all errata at once (brave soul!), click here.
Flamenco Rasgueado (1/2)
9 February 2010
One of the more frequent requests I get in emails and comments here at RF goes something like this: "Hey, could you write out the exact rasgueado fingering you use here?"--"here" being a particular line in a particular arrangement. I’m generally happy to answer these requests, but I’m pretty sure that you readers, as a whole, find it a bit obnoxious that I don’t regularly tab out rasgueado fingerings.
As you might imagine, there’s a reason for this—two reasons, actually. The first is that there are many ways to play a particular rhythmic line—several of which are easily "correct" for a given situation. Depending on how I’m feeling at a particular point in a piece, I may play a rasgueado one way or another. The rhythm will be the same, but the way I produce it is up for grabs: it all depends on the kind of inflection I want at the moment.
The second reason I don’t generally list out rasgueados is that the right hand techniques I use are ones that work for me, but are no means the best for everyone. My triplet rasgueado, for example, works for the shape of my thumb and thumbnail. Players with different hands may well prefer a different style.
That said, I do have a set of "core" rasgueados that I use frequently (and that you will see a lot in my videos and tabs) and I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s downright churlish of me to force folks to squint and my videos to figure out what I’m doing. Hence this article. Here you’ll find:
- a flyover of the basic rasgueados I use most frequently,
- some variations on those rasgueados that come up in the tabs here at Ravenna Flamenco,
- some general tips on practicing rasgueado that I’ve found useful, and
- a downloadable four page rasgueado exercise tab.
NB: Please do keep in mind that this is an explanation--not a lesson. There are lots of “rasgueado lesson” videos on YouTube (and for sale) made by players with much better rasgueado than mine. Watch them. Take what they have to say and use it as it fits you best. Or--better yet!--find a teacher in your area and pick his or her brain mercilessly.
Four Basic Patterns
Most of the rasgueado I use is a variation or combination of four basic patterns, listed below. These examples are taken from the rasgueado exercise tab mentioned above. The 
symbol stands for a downstroke (from bass to treble); the 
symbol stands for an upstroke (from trebel to bass). As for fingerings: p=thumb, i=index, m=middle, a=ring, and ch=pinky.
- Four Stroke Rasgueado
This rasgueado is perhaps one of the most common in modern flamenco. It is made by playing ami down and then coming back up with i:
- Five Stroke Rasgueado
This pattern adds the pinky (ch) in for an extra stroke. Though it comes up in modern playing in compound (i.e. long rolls) or syncopated (i.e. not straight 16th note) forms, in older styles of playing the five stroke rasgueado is more of a staple than its four stroke cousin:
- Triplet Rasgueado
This rasgueado is also very common. In contrast to the four- and five stroke rasgueados above, the motion of the triplet rasgueado originates in the rotation of the wrist. The way I play it, it starts with an upstroke of the thumb and is then followed by downstrokes of a and i:
- Double Triplet Rasgueado
This is perhaps the smoothest and subtlest of these rasgueados. It also easily has the most peculiar name. The "double" here is not in reference to paired triplets (in which case it would better apply to the rasgueado above), but rather to the fact that I find it easiest to think about this rasgueado as a triplet within a triplet. Each beat gets nine strokes; if you count each triplet as part of a larger triplet, it's easier to keep track of the counts while you're learning to coordinate your fingers. It is played only with i and a and, once learned, can create a smooth and fluid "rolling" effect:
Exercises like these are a good start for developing the basic technique of rasgueado. In order to make that technique musical, however, we definitely need to add some variation to these root forms. In the next section I'll discuss exactly that--with more tabbed examples, a video demonstration, and rasgueado practice tips.
>>> go on to page 2: "Variations"
and
"Practicing Rasgueado " >>>
Comments on this article
