I attended many flamenco competitions during time accompanying Gabriel Cabrera on his work schedule as flamenco guitarist.
Initially, my first impression was that a whole series of influences tend to water down the authenticity of competitions, such as small non-representative turn-outs, local favoritism, private business interests, possible inadequacy of judges and the very idea of flamenco being submitted to a contest.
Small turn-outs often occur as professional artists tend to avoid the contests. They realize they have little to gain and much to lose: their professional prestige is staked against a relatively small financial prize. (The contest organized by the Federacion de Penas Flamencas de Málaga offered big prizes for the regional winner – 500.000 ptas. (£2,500) and the recording of 100 LPs and 100 CDs, but this is relatively unusual).
In addition to these problems, in a well organized and straight contest, such as the one organized by the Federación, who is going to be the judge, and by what criteria are the cantes going to be judged by – will only traditional versions of cantes be allowed, or will the artists’ creativity and personality be taken into account?
Even so, they are very useful – for many they are the first rung of a professional career. The listening public has to be silent although this is a lot to ask of a flanenco audience. For those studying, for example the guitar accompaniment of the various palos, there is a guarantee that the guitarrist will be providing the singer a solid platform on which to base his/her cante. Thirdly, they allow an observer to differentiate between the “greats”, of which there are hundreds of recordings, and the andalucian aficionado who leads an orgdinary life and is non-professional.
