Exploring the entanglement of Christian flamenco music and religious experiences: A multi-method approach

The project aims to pioneer an exploratory study on the role of music in shaping and producing religious experiences in the global Pentecostal Christian tradition. Specifically, we set out to understand how the soundscape of the 'Gitano Artist's church' in Madrid, a Gitano church known for its musical practices shaped by flamenco cultural traditions, contributes to the perception of sacred experiences as felt, narrated, and bodily expressed by Gitano believers. This innovative pilot research will employ a multi-method approach, combining ethnographic and music-psychological methods.
Flamenco is a musical art form based on southern Spain's folkloric music traditions. Gitanos have played a leading role in shaping and popularising flamenco music, and flamenco holds an indisputable position in Gitano’s collective identity and sense of cultural heritage. Las palmas—a handclapping style–and quejios (shaking voices) indeed dominate Gitano churches' soundscape. Whereas some Gitano pastors and believers repudiate secular flamenco due to its strong cultural association with Gitano juergas (Gitano revelry) and the abuse of alcohol and drugs, often flamenco’s exuberant voice, tones and beats are re-signified in religious ritual contexts. By redirecting flamenco music for sacred ends, Gitanos use their musical identity to meet religious ends, such as worshipping God, pursuing sanctity, and reaffirming the moral ground of the group.
The pilot project will harness the collective expertise of Dr Antonio Monta?es Jimenez (UK), an expert on Gitano Pentecostalism and the Anthropology of Christianity, and Dr Mats Küsner (Germany), a musicologist and music psychologist specialising in mental imagery. The project will employ various research methods, including in-person participant observation, online qualitative surveys, and mental imagery methods based on drawings, and descriptions of feelings. The project will also benefit from the participation of Gregorio Carmona, a non-academic Pentecostal Gitano and flamenco musician, who has previously collaborated with Antonio Monta?es Jimenez as an interlocutor and co-author in his PhD study on Gitano Pentecostalism.
Ultimately, this seed-funded pilot project will provide interdisciplinary insights to illuminate how music, as a social and cultural phenomenon, may co-constitute human sacred experiences and emotional (visual) imagery about God, the future, and long-lasting personal identities.