Flamenco

By embracing the Spanish folk song form copla and merging influences from pop, Diana Navarro joined a new wave of flamenco-inspired artists seeking to reinvent the genre, bagging a Latin Grammy nomination for her 2005 debut, No Te Olvides De Mi. Her latest, Flamenco, sees the Malaga-born singer turn flamenco purist, with a live album of straight-talking vocals and guitar.

Navarro is clearly well-schooled in flamenco vocal techniques. There's the way she employs sudden changes in dynamics to indicate disturbed and heightened emotional states. She effortlessly manages soaring trills and melisma, when a single syllable of text lasts several notes, drawing appreciative cries from the audience in the Teatro Quintero in Seville (where the album was recorded last July). Tackling styles such as saetna, a religious song typically heard in Holy Week, and guajira (originally Cuban country music), Navarro shows a broad reach, while her performances convey an appropriate rural ambience. ‘Deja Que Te Mire’ is an excellent example of the festive cantiña style, a bold and dramatically wrought vocal with guitar playing in unison, and there are faithful renditions and adept performances throughout. Though it's only when the guitar pulls back, as in opener ‘En La Cabaña Que Habito’, that the vocals hint at something more individualised – a style that's confidential and simmering with intimacy. This could be the way forward for Navarro, for while Flamenco is a capable and valid study in the form, more innovation and less emulation is needed for her to be considered an important artist in her chosen field.