Palos of flamenco part 1: Bulería (continued)
The most common key on the guitar to play bulería, by far, is A Phrygian (also known as ‘por medio’), often capoed at around the second or third fret. (Although this means the effective key is B or C, guitarists will still refer to this as playing in A or ‘por medio’, as the crucial thing is how the chords interact with various open strings rather than the absolute key). Every example so far has been played ‘por medio’. However many other keys are common in bulería - E, B, F#, G#, C# or D# phrygian, and most of the typical (for the guitar) major and minor keys. Singers will often switch to the tonic major or minor, and guitarists are expected to follow and change mode accordingly. Here are a couple of examples of other keys.
Here is singer Montse Cortes accompanied by Diego del Morao in C# Phrygian:
Here is a blistering bulería in D# from Gerardo Nuñez:
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