The flamenco elegance of Rafael Romero

Around the late 1950s and early 1960s of the last century, mairenismo began to take shape, a way of understanding flamenco singing championed by singer Antonio Mairena, with particular emphasis on the so-called Andalusian gypsy forms: soleá, siguiriya, and tonás.

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Before mairenismo, and for decades, ópera flamenca held sway, a school of ornate singing that served as a link toward the relative austerity of mairenismo. But if we look for it, between operismo and mairenismo there was also the reign of the Hispavox Anthology, directed by guitarist Perico el del Lunar and recorded by the French company Ducretet Thomson. It proved to be an important link in the transition between the old or classic singing and the current “classic” style that might be called camaronismo, without losing the powerful influence of maestro Antonio Mairena.

Up to that point, the “identity card” of that magnificent work by Perico, the first of its kind, featuring leading singers of the time: Bernardo el de los Lobitos, Pericón de Cádiz, Niño de Almadén, Antonio el Chaqueta, Jarrito, and Pepe el de la Matrona, as well as Rafael Romero “El Gallina” (Andújar, Jaén, 1910–1991), the focus of this review and remembrance.

It’s possible that El Gallina is the standout performer of the anthology, as well as the one with the most powerful presence. There’s an organic lament in his delivery, the power of sad sweetness in his siguiriyas, caña, tonás, peteneras, alboreá, debla, martinete, and mirabrás. Always bearing his unmistakable stamp, alongside Perico’s original guitar work…the guitarist even had to teach some of the forms to the singers.

"Pain that aches beautifully, pain that delivers the cantes as they are meant to be, and as you’ve never heard them before, a musical riddle… How good flamenco singing is, how it enriches our existence"

Adjectives come pouring out… Pain that aches beautifully, pain that delivers the cantes as they are meant to be, and as you’ve never heard them before, a musical riddle… How good flamenco singing is, how it enriches our existence. And that face of El Gallina’s, with its indigenous features, a poem of intense, lived emotion that has left its mark.

No wonder Rafael Romero played a Native American in a film, he was a perfect fit for the part. Among other appearances, he also sings in Brindis a Manolete (1948), featuring a sober choreography by a group of male dancers to Romero’s petenera, a cante that would come to be identified with the singer.

A voice worn just enough, always in search of that second-hand pain that suits flamenco so well. In 1973, the Chair of Flamencología y Estudios Folklóricos de Jerez awarded him its National Prize for Singing, but the final years of his life were difficult ones. The Madrid tablao Zambra, where Rafael had been a regular for 18 years, closed two years later, and the brilliant veteran cantaor, sadly out of step with the times, was left in poverty.

Rafael Romero sang for dance in the companies of José Greco, Teresa y Luisillo, and Antonio, as well as at the Seville Flamenco Biennial, in Madrid tablaos, and in recordings made in Japan. The only contact I had with him was at the Congosto bar, where the cantaor used to stop by carrying himself with the elegant bearing of a patriarch, a monument to the flamenco singing of an earlier era. ♦