I say this as a prelude to the review of the new book that Almuzara is now publishing; 'The flamenco' in Chaves Nogales and which includes a good part of the booklet (very brief) some excerpts from the aforementioned book, very paradigmatic, you have to recognize it, from the epic of the mischievous dancer Juan Martínez and his flamenco troupe. This gold filling alone is not worth the purchase of the same, but a few articles that summarize his look at the most international cultural phenomenon of those that adorn our bull skin., no matter who no matter. The vision of Chaves Nogales goes through some aspects that follow from radiant news among flamencology and that I would place them under the greater support of a simple phrase but founded on an axiom: «desconfiad de los que solo se muestran partidarios de un tipo de cante».

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En realidad, no fue así: la segunda jornada, hubo tormenta y lluvia. Eso no impidió el éxito de público. Los cronistas hablan de la recaudación de más de 30.000 pesetas, por la venta de entradas, and the asistencia de unas cuatro mil personas.

Entre ellos estaban Zuloaga, Andrés Segovia, Santiago Rusiñol, Fernando de los Ríos, Edgar Neville, Ramón Gómez de la Serna, Melchor Fernández Almagro, Adolfo Salazar, los musicólogos John B. Trend y Kurt Schlinder… No acudieron pero sí se habían adherido Pérez de Ayala, Bagaría, Díez Canedo, Julio Camba, Antonio y Manuel Machado, Guillermo de Torre, Gutiérrez Solana, Romero de Torres…

Abrió la primera sesión Ramón Gómez de la Serna: además de dirigirse al público presente, lo hizo también a las «moras errantes» y a los «reyes moros espectrales» pero la gente no estaba para discursos, quería oír cantar. (Años después, Isabel García Lorca, la hermana de Federico, recordaba que interrumpieron a Ramón varias veces con aplausos, para que abreviara).

LEE EL ARTÍCULO COMPLETO AQUÍ

You were the friendly face, the smile that many of us who were somewhat younger saw on the stage of the Peña Flamenca Torres Macarena sharing your presentations with a golden beak. And lots of flamenco. Defender of criticism, I bring the young people closer, fair with the veterans… inveterate fan, tireless worker, celestino, creator of flamenco clubs and entities, this or that way. That there is no headquarters? Well, in a hut and we take it to the street. Here there is a group of sensitive people and that neighborhood is orphaned of corners for the pinch. Allí que propiciaba él que se diera el duende para congregar a un puñao de nuevos y viejos apasionaos de este dulce veneno que hemos compartío hasta tu partida.

Not even the damn illness prostrated you in bed and, crawling, from the hand of your inseparable wife and beloved Well, who looked with his camera at your words telling the majesty of art, in a The Bambera, a Flamenco Aires, a He Carbonerillo the a Torres Macerena, to name a few where we enjoyed your presence the most, para restregarte por el pecho los últimos zamarreones de jondura para alivio del alma.

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El presidente de Mazaco, Pepe Esquivel, dio la palabra a Concha Prieto, directiva de la Peña Flamenca de Tomares, presidenta de la Federación y de la Confederación de Peñas Flamencas de Andalucía, y primera mujer en ocupar este cargo que tan bien está llevando para gloria de la afición. Ella se encargó de abrir el acto glosando la figura de Manuel, presentando a los artistas y entregándole como deferencia el cartel enmarcado al hermano del homenajeado, Jesús Molina, presente entre el público.

Abrió Angelita por tientos tangos y las mecías de su gañote comenzaron a hacerme cosquillas. Jugueteó con los tiempos, parándose donde quiso, haciéndolo distinto. Nunca la he escuchao mal. Y aunque no se prodiga como cantaora larga, sí es extensa en las letras y en la entrega, porque no se guarda na y le bastan un puñao de cantes pa revolcarme de gusto. Eso es lo que hizo desde que despegó la comisura de los labios para el deleite del respetable, que la acurrucó con jaleos y oles en los momentos justos. Dura y bravía como rezaban sus letras, pero no amarga, sino dulce como el caramelo espetó su torrente cristalino de colores morenos.

DESCUBRE LA CRÓNICA COMPLETA DE KIKO VALLE

To understand the reasons of those who devised it, promoted and controlled, We must first know who were those people who gave it the known form, as well as the reasons that led them to make the decision to convene this event, by then, de magnitudes absolutamente inimaginables.

The organizers / Idea

Back in the twenties, in the never sufficiently considered city of Granada, an illustrious group of flamenco fans belonging to the intellectual universe of the arts in general, composed of musicians, painters, writers, the poet, set designers, philosophers, journalists, politicians, etc. People who met frequently in the Cafe Alameda from Granada, where they formed the famous Rinconcillo Gathering, while surely, They would share their hobby with the local singers of their time in the famous Montillana or else, in the tavern Polinario, how could they be Paquillo the Gas, The Zucchini, Rafael Galvez, John of the Cross, Antonio Barrios (a) The Polinario, Picorreondo, Miguel Milena (a) Child from Granada, in addition to many other flamencos, that in those parts let the Granada nightingales sprout that, in its sonorous display, They competed with the jets of fresh water that flow from the Sierra Nevada towards the Generalife and the Alhambra., and that the people of Granada delight in drinking from the sung Fuente del Avellano, where, as the song says, nace “La flor de la canelita”.
Our thoughtful members discussed the bad times that the Jondo style was going through.. Dissertations focused on the fact that the Jondo was synonymous with the old, authentic and genuine Andalusian. On the contrary, Flamenco was something mixed and therefore contaminated with the singing that professionals did to be able to bring a plate of food to their children. (evil professionals, who work for money).

I want to think that they must have also regretted the little qualitative space that was left for what was Spanish or traditional in the land., that was gradually cornered by foreign musical genres, which plenty of frivolity, female skin shows, laughter, dances and bohemian fun, They had enthroned themselves in the halls and party rooms, without giving any quarter to the singers of the vilified Andalusian art, those who really talked about this; professional artists, those who created the soleares and the seguiriyas, although at that time, for future jondistas, These were the cause of all the evils of flamenco contamination with “flamenquista inventions” such as malagueñas., granaínas o fandangos.

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So far this century, It is very common to find foreign students and young people who actively participate in these meeting places.; Welcome to these spaces of interpretation and learning, not only for club members and fans, in which various rocks converge with each other, which augurs for a good future of brotherhood and exercise of this art that we love so much.. Finally, I want to highlight that it can be a unique opportunity to renew the age groups of the members, already high, and to be able to attract young people to guarantee the permanence of our associative fabric, aware of our strength and capacity as agents of the flamenco universe, which, together with the gatherings of the oldest and most consolidated clubs with their own headquarters, multiplican la proyección universal del género en nuestros pueblos y ciudades.

What would you say differentiates this work from any other about flamenco singing and its didactics??

I certainly think it has its originality.. It's more, That's where the idea of ​​it comes from.. The editor proposed it to me, Manuel Ramos Ramos, by Colibrí Ediciones, thinking that there was no book specifically dedicated to how to make lyrics for flamenco singing. Management, for hobby and for being a researcher and critic of flamenco books, lots of bibliography, and I haven't found one similar, focused in depth and throughout an entire book on the creation of flamenco lyrics or couplets. There are teaching books, Of course, I have published some myself, where their literary characteristics are discussed, pero en un contexto más general.

José Luis Rodríguez Ojeda, author of the prologue, states in it that you know a large number of letters by heart. Do you remember the first song you learned?? When and how was it?

Bueno, I appreciate your words in the prologue. I became interested in flamenco shortly before I was twenty., and I'm sixty-four, after listening to a flamenco club in my town, Stops (Sevilla), to the singer Miguel Vargas, of whom I would later make a book and who would become my favorite singer. Remembering the first lyric that stuck in my mind is difficult, but yes I could point, on the one hand, some performed by Miguel, or by José Domínguez el Cabrero, who was another of my youth idols. Let's take for example, respectively, a lyric for soleá by Moreno Galván in Miguel's cante and another from a fandango by Elena Bermúdez, the goatherd's wife:

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There is no applause in the studio. Solo silencio. Mayte Martín canta como quien enciende una vela en mitad de la prisa. «In Illo Tempore» no es solo un regreso: es una invocación. La llamada a un tiempo en el que el arte no era mercancía sino necesidad interior; no era consumo, sino destino. En una época que premia la inmediatez, recupera una palabra incómoda , ética, y la sitúa en el centro del cante. Porque el flamenco, sostiene, no es ceniza, sino fuego, y el fuego no se vende: se custodia. Bajo esa luz antigua –la elegancia indómita de La Niña de la Puebla y la autoridad irrepetible de Pastora Pavón– su voz vuelve al origen no para repetirlo, sino para habitarlo con verdad .

«In Illo Tempore» suena a invocación. ¿Qué significa hoy en día cantar desde ese tiempo casi sagrado?

Es una forma de resistencia. Vivimos en la prisa, en lo efímero, en lo inmediato, y yo necesitaba volver a lo esencial. El arte no puede separarse de la ética. Cuando eso ocurre deja de llamarse arte. Este disco nace de esa convicción: custodiar algo que no nos pertenece, pero que nos ha sido confiado.

Habla de respeto religioso al flamenco que la parió. ¿Cómo se ama una tradición sin convertirla en museo, una partitura de música clásica?

Preservando el fuego, no adorando la ceniza. Si la congelas, la matas; si la trivializas, also. Hay que sostenerla con libertad, pero desde el cuidado. Yo le debo al flamenco mi manera de estar en el mundo. La música me salvó la vida cuando no sabía defenderme ni expresar lo que me dolía. Me dio una voz. Desde ese agradecimiento nace el respeto.

Ha pasado veinticinco años sin grabar flamenco. ¿Qué ha tenido que ordenarse para que este disco existiera?

Una culminación interior. No podía hacerlo antes. Soy independiente y eso implica asumir todas las decisiones. He producido el disco sola, durante un año y medio. Cada detalle, cada mezcla. Si algo no estaba en su sitio, no lo dejaba pasar. Necesitaba sentir que lo que dejaba grabado era verdad. Ahora sí siento que todo estuvo en su lugar.

«Entreverao» y «Puro», las partes de tu último trabajo, parecen dos geografías distintas.

Son dos maneras de habitar mi memoria. En «Entreverao» conviven otras músicas, hay una intervención creativa más evidente. En «Pur»o hay menos imaginación añadida y más respeto al canon. Pero incluso en el flamenco más tradicional existe un filtro que es el mío. No hay interpretación sin identidad.

Usted insiste en la ética del cante. ¿Dónde están los límites?

En no venderse al mejor postor, el flamenco no se vende. No porque te vendas tú, sino porque vendes algo que es sagrado. El arte ha salvado a muchas personas de la ruina espiritual. A mí me salvó. Los artistas tenemos una responsabilidad moral: custodiar, proteger, respetar. Cuando la ética desaparece, el arte pierde su nombre.

En vísperas del 8 March, ¿qué mujeres atraviesan su genealogía flamenca?

Muchas, y muy poderosas. Pienso en la Niña de la Puebla, una mujer culta, independiente, adelantada a su tiempo. Tenía una dulzura enorme, pero también una fortaleza interior impresionante. Supo hacerse respetar en un mundo difícil sin perder elegancia ni profundidad artística. Y pienso, how not, en Pastora Pavón, la Niña de los Peines. Fue pionera, amplió repertorios, dejó una huella que todavía respiramos. En ella había arte y carácter. No eran solo voces admirables: eran mujeres con una conciencia de sí mismas muy fuerte.

¿Han sido también referentes éticos?

Sí. Muchas tuvieron que luchar en estructuras familiares y sociales muy rígidas. La historia del flamenco la escribieron mayoritariamente hombres, pero ellas conquistaron su espacio en el escenario y fuera de él. Y cuando una mujer se sienta en las tablas, ahí no hay discurso que valga: hay que demostrar. Y lo han hecho.

Después de este regreso, ¿qué siente cuando canta?

Libertad. Más anchura. Me siento distinta, más madura. Bien acompañada con José Gálvez. Cierro una etapa y abro otra. Cantar ahora es más desnudo. Ya no necesito demostrar nada. Solo estar.

The common thread of this new work by the director of Pico Reja and Fandango are the conversations that her granddaughter, the actress Adelfa Calvo, recorded with her when the artist was 82 years. “This story comes to me through Adelfa, with whom he had a professional relationship”, Malvárez remembers. “We were together at the Feroz gala, and she asked me to go to Malaga to eat with her, because he wanted to tell me a story. He explained to me what he was doing 40 years ago that he had begun to collect material from his grandmother, because I intended to make a book or a documentary. He even recorded part of his family. When she gave me those documents, I saw that there was a story to tell, about a character that I found fascinating. But he didn't want to tell only his grandmother's life., sino la historia de una nieta que quiere hacer una película sobre su abuela”.

Born in La Puebla de Cazalla, Sevilla, in 1908, Dolores Jiménez Alcántara gave early signs of talent, He debuted very young under the inspiration of the idol Pepe Marchena, your great reference, and married another estimable singer, Luquitas de Marchena, against the opinion of a too strict father. Throughout his life he covered a wide spectrum of songs, “although he carried Los Campanilleros in his repertoire during 70 years", comments Malvárez. “She was an artist who never abandoned flamenco, although he also interpreted it from other shores. Between the end of the 40 and principles of 70, with the emergence of flamenco song, many like Marchena, Caracol or Valderrama adapted those songs. At the time of the great mass flamenco shows, she positioned herself in that place, haciendo una versión más ligera del cante jondo”.

Internal exile

“It had a hinge position between cante and copla”, the director continues. “He maintained a very personal style, far from the role that many women used to have in this field. She created a subgenre and was able to make the style that characterized her commercial.. Its aesthetic was very different., Their canons of femininity and beauty had nothing to do with those prevailing at the time.. She was a sober woman, singing standing up, no flowers, no shawls, out of all folklorism, not only because of his blindness. Decía que no se veía interpretando las canciones como otras compañeras”.
Another characteristic of Dolores was an icon of republicanism, who after the tragic outcome of the Civil War became part of the so-called internal exile. In the documentary, the artist goes so far as to assure that “for much less than what I did or said, “They killed people.”. “He positioned himself during the fight, stayed in Madrid, He went to the La Pasionaria rallies and even did a version of Los Campanilleros that was only sung during the war., The Bell Ringers of Liberty. He was about to go into exile on a boat in Valencia, but he realized that he was going to a concentration camp, and since he had small children he did not dare to go up. Una familia la acogió en Málaga y aquí se quedó”.

This internal exile is also manifested in the fact that “Dolores had to hide her freedoms in a drawer and survive.”, like so many women. There is always talk of the exile of those who left, of those who killed, but not so much of those who stayed and had to adapt. She always lived in fear, but he continued to retain his sense of freedom at home, transmitiéndoselo a su familia”.

eternal night

“Eternal night of my eyes/ light hidden in the shadows/ I live in the darkness/ with no other light than my life/ light and life are my song/ like tears I felt”, he sang in a thrilling milonga. Eye drops administered by an incompetent doctor deprived her of her sight, condemning her to walk around the world and the stages behind black glasses. “He assumed his blindness not as an impediment, but as something natural. He was a person who overcame a disability, He launched his career and was an empowered person., with the values ​​of the Republic, and turned his physical handicap into a symbol. She was a businesswoman, She contradicted her father's will and went beyond the destiny that the society of her time reserved for disabled women.. She said she liked the world as she imagined it., no tenía ningún interés en verlo como realmente era”.

When asked what he expects from his documentary, in which current figures such as María Peláe or Sandra Carrasco participate, Malvárez affirms that “the first thing is to agree with what you want to say.”, and after the public accepts it. Our intention has been to recover a figure that represents many women of the time, do not forget our female references, how those grandmothers knew how to survive a war. Characters like La Niña de la Puebla provide values ​​and memory, son necesarios para seguir construyendo nuestro presente”.

La dedicatoria a Manuel Molina recuerda la profunda huella que dejó el artista sevillano en la música andaluza. Integrante del legendario dúo Lole y Manuel, Molina fue uno de los creadores que abrieron nuevas sendas expresivas dentro del flamenco, combinando tradición y sensibilidad poética. Su influencia sigue presente en generaciones posteriores de artistas y aficionados, por lo que este circuito se plantea también como un reconocimiento a su legado creativo y a su manera singular de entender el cante y la guitarra.

El cartel reúne a un amplio abanico de intérpretes que actuarán en peñas de diferentes localidades sevillanas. En el apartado del cante participarán Angelita Montoya, Julián Jaramillo, Raquel Rooms, Fermin Garcia, Carmela Espinosa, Joni Torres, Marta Aguilar, Africa Granados, Lidia Rodríguez, Roberto Montaño, Juanel, Luis Ortega y Esperanza Garrido, mientras que el baile estará representado por Manuel de Lola and ANA OROPESA. Las actuaciones se celebrarán en espacios flamencos de municipios como Coria del Río, Spartinas, Herrera, The Viso del Alcor, Guardians Castle, Lora del Río, Santiponce, Martin de la Jara, Miguéltur, The Algaba, Major Island, Coripe, Ecija, Burguillos o Las Cabezas de San Juan.

Con esta programación, la Federación de Peñas Flamencas de Sevilla reafirma su compromiso con la difusión del flamenco en el territorio y con el impulso de artistas que mantienen vivo el género sobre los escenarios de las peñas. El circuito se convierte así en un espacio de encuentro entre tradición, afición y nuevas voces del cante y el baile, al tiempo que mantiene viva la memoria de figuras esenciales como Manuel Molina.