The 1970s was a kind of transition the more minimalist and traditional music of the 1960s and the rock explosion of the 1980s. It was a period of stylistic experimentation two periods that were so important for musical creation in the Basque Country. There is an emblematic date from those times: 27 March 1976, when the 24 ordu euskeraz initiative was held in the Anoeta velodrome in San Sebastian, with more than 10,000 people in attendance. It was organised by Herri Irratia and the Artze brothers, Bedaxagar, Lete, Knörr, Laboa, Lertxundi, Lupe, Mendibil, Oskarbi and Peio eta Pantxoa and the Sakabi eta Egañazpi trikitixa took part, as well as other activities.
In Alava, Gorka Knörr stands out, quite popular in his day with songs like Araba, Azken agurraren negarra (Morts pour la patrie) or Zergatik ?, with several albums recorded (Araba kantari, Nik nahi dudana, Guttunak), some more recent (Gogoaren taupadak, 2000), and later known as a politician. Patxi Villamor had a certain popularity with the record Nora goaz, from 1977, and returned in 1980 with Esperantz a, but without excessive popular echo. The jazz-rock group Fausto was also one of the pioneering projects of truly modern music in Vitoria. From the capital of Alava is the very veteran drummer Ángel Celada who, in addition to his serious jazz adventures, has had a thousand and one rock experiences. He was the drummer of the original Orquesta Mondragón, born in San Sebastián in 1976, and has even created a school at home: his own son Víctor.
However, the Vitoria and, therefore, Alava's pop scene seems to have been the slowest in the southern Basque Country, although in the eighties it was certainly explosive: Hertzainak, La Polla Records, Cicatriz, Potato and a long etcetera.
The pioneering Algarvian magazine Muskaria asked itself precisely in 1980, Eta Gasteiz zer? and its columnist Zeledonius Monk concluded by saying:
‘Why so little real movement in Gasteiz? It is important the absence of a radio station that echoes the little, the very little, that comes out here. Also, the issue of concerts with people from other places: they are very few because of the incredible scarcity of affordable venues. The individuals who have come out here have done so against the tide. Gorka Knörr, Patxi Villamor, Lantzale, Fausto’.
The birth of Oskorri in Bilbao in 1971 marked a turning point in contemporary Basque popular music because it eventually became the longest-lived and most prolific group experience. It has been based in Bilbao, around Natxo de Felipe and Antxon Latxa, although from the beginning many of its members have come from other towns. It has carved out a path of musical evolution and enrichment: years before fusion sounds invaded the western market, Oskorri was already practising a mixture of traditional Basque roots and new ways of pop or jazz influence. He discovered Basque literary authors as far away from each other as Gabriel Aresti and Mosen Beñat Etxepare. It has also been able to weather the ups and downs in the musical tastes of fans. Initiatives such as the s with children's texts Katuen testamentua and Marijane kanta zan!, his saga The Pub Ibiltaria, or the publication of the songbooks Ehun eta hamaikatxo kantu (Elkar, 1990) and Euripean kantari (2001) maintain Oskorri as one of the great proposals of Basque popular music. With the notable collaboration of Kepa Junkera, renovator of the trikitixa. Although without too much close competition because there are hardly any other attempts at group fusion in the old Señorío bizkaitarra, apart from less y experiments like that of the ‘Celtic’ group Lauburu, which included in its ranks some Anglo-Saxon musician.
Gontzal Mendibil and Xeberri were another of the proposals for the ‘modernisation’ of Basque song. Mendibil continued to insist on a pop terrain and his latest work breaks with the past to a certain extent because it is about collective performances or collaborations such as the musical theatre Iparragirre hegalaria, starring the inhabitants of his home town, Zeanuri. Maite Idirin and Lupe were some of the few Basque-speaking female voices in Bizkaia. Another singer-songwriter, who still performs and records from time to time, is Joseba Gotzon. In his last few appearances, he has veered towards the romantic side of pop. Mendibil, Gotzon and Niko Etxart have toured the world with a joint in support of the Basque national football team. And there were other Biscayan singing surnames such as Bittor Egurrola, Joseba Etxeberria, etc. But the great pop group from Bilbao in the seventies and eighties was Mocedades, who took over the success from Los Mitos.
Biscayan groups of rockers, rock-jazzers and similar variants were Crisis, Acera, Cocktail, Aster, Danger, Amanita, City Rockers, Corrupción, Crimen y Castigo, Cumen, Enbor, Kartoffen, Laster, Mauricio Vicio y su Conjunto, Leikes, Maldoror, Feet, Fase, Evohe and many others. Biscayan protopunk was played by Las Vulpes, MCD, Nacional 634 and Eskorbuto.
the two decades, performers such as Antton Valverde, Imanol Larzabal, Iñaki Auzmendi, Urko, Fernando Unsain, Ibai Rekondo, Jon Bergaretxe (not to be confused with another more recent Basque singer of the same name from Oiartzun), Antton Haranburu, Miren Aranburu, Aitor Badiola, etc. stood out. Even though the stylistic roots of all of them were traditional, the evolution of those who continued in the creative gap opened up, logically, to schemes of fusion or influence with pop, jazz and other contemporary sounds. Valverde has accumulated a very personal oeuvre in which his musical version of the Biscayan poet Lauaxeta and his collaborations with his old partner Xabier Lete stand out. Both have had an irregular public presence and Lete has added to his remarkable collection of popular songs an important incursion into bertsolaritza. Imanol first recorded as Michel Etxegaray, due to the general difficulties of Basque music with Franco's censorship, increased in his case by the fact that he had to go into exile. He has subsequently accumulated an extensive body of work with the ultimate novelty of performing in Spanish. He collaborated extensively with the Breton folk-rock band Gwendal, and more recently with Paco Ibáñez in a recording that the Basque-Parisian made in Basque. Joxean Larrañaga Urko, from San Sebastián, popularised some hymn-songs with Basque content (Guk euskaraz ) or romantic ones (Maite maite maitia ) and has collected an irregular work with chapters such as the recording of popular airs from his city, incursions into reggae or a revision of the poet José Bergamín from Madrid, who spent his last years in the capital of Gipuzkoa, and in which he fleetingly counted on the southern singer-songwriter José Menese.
The Hondarribitar player Txomin Artola followed the most typical patterns of Anglo-Saxon-influenced folk-pop (despite not using the harmonica), due to the way he modulated his vocals and the way he accompanied himself on the guitar. In addition to the hippie-like nature of his themes (including his Basque-language version of the naturalist poet Walt Whitman), for the urban minimalism of songs like Goizeko euri artean, a composition that would be ‘poperised’ by Haizea, the interesting musical experiment by Artola himself, Amaia Zubiria and other musicians, which Txomin abandoned before the second and final recording, Ontz gaua, after which the pioneering experiment was dissolved. Txomin has accumulated an important body of his own work, plus the albums made as a duo with Amaia Zubiria and the most recent artistic union with his own son Urbil. Izukaitz was born in Eibar in 1974, with Fran Lasuen and Bixente Martinez (both musicians from Oskorri) on the instrumental part and Odile Krutzeta on vocals. Their pleasant folk-pop band suffered a similar fate to Haizea's: they disbanded after recording two albums. Both Lasuen and Martínez have subsequently taken part in different projects: Txatanuga Futz Band or Eguen Banda, the former, and Hiru Truku or Igelaren Banda the latter.
Iñaki Eizmendi, from Andoain, had a short but original musical career in the key of personal pop in which his emotive vocal capacity and an innovative urban musical style stood out in records such as Gureak ez diren, kale ixileen, bi milagarren samiña and the double LP Zaldi erratu hatsa (1981). He later dedicated himself to television production work. Other voices of the 70s and 80s were the aforementioned Bilbao group Mocedades -perhaps the most successful Biscayan musical expression in the Spanish market-, from which the duo Sergio and Estibaliz and later Amaia Uranga, who in her maturity recorded an album entirely in Basque for the Donostia-based Elkar label, left the group. A personal experience was that of Patxi Andion, a classical voice interpreter based in Madrid who once revisited the bard Iparagirre.
In the coastal area Gipuzkoa and Bizkaia (Mutriku-Ondarroa), the verbenero group Indar Trabes was formed, from which Itoiz would emerge, first in a symphonic style and later consolidated as the leading exponent of Basque pop-rock in the 70s and 80s, and considered a key link in the evolution of young Basque music.
Juan Carlos Pérez was their central surname. They recorded their first homonymous record in 1978 and the song Lau teilatu would become one of the best-known pop tunes in the Basque Country ever since. J.C. Perez then continued as a composer of television and even classical music, without abandoning his autonomous rock facet. There were more symphonic rock groups such as the Donostia-based Sakre (with the 1977 album Bizitako gauzak) or Atman, also from Donostia, among others.
the seventies and the eighties in the Gipuzkoan capital there were bands with a clear Anglo-Saxon flavour, such as the rockers Brakaman, who recorded an LP, and above all the Orquesta Mondragón, led by Javier Gurruchaga and the guitarist Jaime Stinus, who later emigrated to Barcelona to work as a music producer. Ruper Ordorika was born in Oñati, but lived Vitoria and Bilbao. In the Biscayan capital he would meet other restless minds who would form the so-called Pott Banda (Jimu Iturralde, Jon Juaristi, Bernardo Atxaga, Joseba Sarrionaindia). Ruper decided to sing in public around 1976, recorded his first album (Hautsi da anphora) in 1980 and in his subsequent career has personified the new image of the singer-songwriter of the 80s: rockerised and accompanied by an instrumental group.
In addition to the aforementioned Etxamendi and Larralde, Manex Pagola, Jean-Mixel Bedaxagar and above all Peio eta Pantxoa, who achieved spectacular sales success with their 1975 double album and patriotic hymns such as Itziarren semea. More active names in Ipartarra song have been the group Guk (Beñat Sarasola, Joannes Borda, Eneko Labèguerie, Pampi Lakarien), the lyrical shepherd Erramun Martikorena and others. the 70s and 80s, the group Urria was active, with a couple of recordings. Beñat Axiary, an experimental singer who has embarked on numerous independent stylistic projects and is the brainchild of the Errobiko festibala alternative festivals held every summer in the town of Itxassou, Lapurdi, would emerge from this group.
In 1974, the influential rock group Errobi appeared in Iparralde (the result of the group Orquesta del Fuego), with Michel Ducau and Anje Duhalde and with temporary support such as the bass player and later prolific producer in Euskadi sur, Jean Phocas. It was a stylistic turning point (Michel, Anje and the rest of the musicians came from traditional music, street parties, jazz and even the conservatory) north of the Bidasoa, with milestones like the live album Bizi bizian, recorded in Tolosa and Azkoitia in 1978 and pioneer of a recording formula that has been ed since then in dozens of similar experiences among rock groups in the Basque Country. After the dissolution of Errobi, Duhalde was in the verbena band Akelarre and then continued a long solo career. Ducau formed Zaldibobo and has recorded with his wife Caroline Philips.
Another outstanding Ipartarra rocker is Niko Etxart, from Zuberoa, who began performing and recording in Paris to release his first record in Euskadi in 1979. He was the initiator of groups such as Ximinorak and Minxoriak and, still active as a singer, he is responsible for the Kilikas recording studio. Other musical names of ultrapuertos have been Pantxika and Gexan, Roger Idiart, Jojo eta Ramontxo, the very beautiful voice of Maddi Oihenart, Pier Paul Berzaitz and others.
María Ostiz, from Pamplona, was an excellent voice of the most mellow Hispanic pop, and Serafín Zubiri, also from Navarre and blind, has taken up the baton of the romantic pop genre in recent years. Joxe Anjel Irigarai, also from Navarre, but in an artistic and ideological sense quite different from the above, was once an influential surname in the Basque-speaking Ez dok Amairu collective and recorded popular songs such as Erribera. There were Basque-language groups such as Ortzadar, and very ideologically radicalised singer-songwriters such as Fermín Valencia (Pamplona), Muruzabal (San Martín de Unx) or Iosu Goya (Bera-Vera de Bidasoa) were heard; all in a naked folk key.
Groups like Los Rebeldes would introduce the love for manes and the hippy postculture in the 70s. Disco-Club 29 in Calle Navarrería and other venues in the area were the first to programme foreign noises, soon embraced by the youth of Iruña, especially in the form of hard rock. From the ashes of the pioneering groups would come experiences such as Tubos de Plata, Sparto, Ligarza, Mugre, Kafarnaún, Kaifás, Ligarza, Nerón, School, Tocamás and other variants such as the pro-punk Tensión, from Burlada. Magdalena, a symphonic rock group, recorded the first rock LP from Navarre, entitled Lanean sartzen, on the Donostia IZ label.