In 1901 the disk of flamenco appears, and a new period of incomes and circulation opens for this art, logically for 2 of its columns: the cante and the guitar.
About the start of the industry of slate disks or disks the master Chacón expressed 1 : I have 10 disks made with the master Habichuela for the company Odeón 2. They paid me 10 thousand pesetas 3 . I did not like the pieces after exposing them. Please believe that those disks made me crazy because they went around the entire world [...] In the year 1913, I recorded 10 disks with Ramón Montoya for an American company 4. They paid me 10 thousand reales 5. The disks turned out well. They are 2 malagueñas and soleares. The company decided to record more but I have not received any notice since then. 6
In parallel to the appearence of the new market, and even though Sevilla still had a good flamenco atmosphere, a large amount of artists decide to venture in Madrid, to the theatres. The cafés cantantes start its decline due to the competition that causes the flamenco shows in the theatres. The growth of that new offer captures a new and numerous audience who feels attracted by many and good artists who were performing there.
1, During the aforementioned interview, when he refers to economic quantities, he uses the following terms without distinction: onza, duros, pesetas and reales.
2, 1909 according to the searching in the database of the records http://flun.cica.es/flamenco_y_universidad/discografia/consulta
3, Textual in the original interview
4, Gramophone, obtained from the mentioned source in the interview 2
5, Textual in the original interview
6, Galerín, quoted interview
From the 20s, they start to see that the flamenco shows are changing and it was included in the type called Opera flamenca. Polemic field or name that more than one "flamencologist" pretends to explain by the differences of percentages that the shows paid: the artistic and variety ones 10%; the instrumental ones and singing ones 3% 1
Pepa Marchena relates us the situation of the flamenco and the new type of show which was setting off: "In this period, people sang everything, but what the audience liked, like it has happened always, were the fandangos; as for the performers, ones who were the best and pleased the audience the most were Tomás Pavón and Chacón [...] In the 30s, after the Opera Flamenca, which I already told you that I was performing until the end of 1929 2 I did a tour through France with Ramón Montoya"3.
1, José Manuel Gamboa takes to pieces or pretends to do it in his article “Malos entendidos que se han hecho fuertes en la Flamencología”
2, Started in 1924 with Chacón, La Niña de los Peines, Cepero and El cojo de Málaga
3, Ramos Alfonso, Ramón: Pepe Machena: Apuntes biograficos y artisticos. Townhall of Marchena. Sevilla. 1996
The Opera flamenca opened large spaces for the flamenco, with performances in many theatres and bullrings. It was a period of great bailaoras and bailaores, like Antonia Mercé La Argentina, Vicente Escudero, Imperio Argentina, Encarnación López, La Argentinita, and their younger releaves like Antonio, Rosario, Carmen Amaya, Pilar López etc.
This modality of presenting flamenco shows continues in the postwar, almost until the middle of the 50s. In the last years it was changing and going back to the “aflamencada (flamenco inspired)” variety. Juan Valderrama expresses it clearly: “There was a moment I had to sing songs, which are not flamenco, out of needs of money that we, flamencos, needed to live. I did it like the bull fighter who sticks “banderillas” but I am a flamenco singer from head to toe and I know all the cantes which exist in the flamenco and I sing them all.“ 1
1, Burgos, Antonio: Juanito Valderrama Mi España querida. La Esfera de los Libros. Madrid. 2004
Flamenco with this form of show went around practically all the villages of Spain where some kind of infrastructure to perform was available. The province of Sevilla, with the data of publication year 1950 1, they maintained a large number of seats on offer, not less than now, even though flamenco had lower competence among the entertainment of the moment. In those years, the province of Sevilla had 1.111.344 inhabitants, including the capital with 382.564 inhabitants. The number of places of exhibition was 153, fundamentally cinemas, with 104.800 seats, of which 48.600 in the capital, and 7.630of them were in places with stage. And 56.200 seats in the province, 17.000 of which were in places with those characteristics ( with stage ). In those infrastructures, 43 were summer cinemas with 39.600b seats, taking into account that there was a certain tradition of doing some flamenco shows in those establishments during the summer.
1, Cuevas Puente, Antonio (dtor ): Anuario Cinematográfico Hispanoamericano. Servicio de Estadística del Sindicato Nacional del Espectáculo. Madrid. 1950.
So-called Economic Developism of the 70s and the growth of the tourism contributed to the proliferation of the tablaos, as modernization of the Café Cantante, especially in monumental cities and destinations for sunshine and beaches. They updated a similar model to what Nestor Luján described: "The Zambras were celebrated as a touristic service of the period for the romantic travellers."1 The dance was the base of the show, and the predominant audience was foreigner, as a result, those new places fulfilled various roles: generate new jobs; take the flamenco closer to the cities of origin of the tourists; and also, serve as the media of the flamenco with the reports and documentary that people made.
1, Parra, Antonio: Cafés Cantantes Historia y Documentos. Escuela Superior de Arte Dramático. Murcia, 2001.
In parallel to the previous one, once the cycle of the Opera Flamenca ended during the 50s, the flamenco festivals appear. The festival started in Sevilla with El Potaje de Utrera in 1957, Mairena de Alcor in 1962, El Gazpacho de Morón in 1963, and La Caracolá de Lebrija in 1966. In the notes on the bottom, we gather what Antonio Mairena 1 , one of forerunners of the festivals, and El Turronero 2 , one of its regular artists in the 70s, commented about the festivals in different interviews.
1 "I promoted the festivals and helped them as much as possible since its birth, because I realized that in the tablaos, the baile subordinate the cante, and the cante was deafening and suffocating. [...] In my opinion, the festivals had a positive side, well, thanks to them, one sings to listen and one plays to sing, something that one could not do in the tablaos, and in the festivals, the artists find an aid to live." García Ulecia, Alberto, op.cit.
2 Juan Toro, Interview to El Turronero 1998. www.deflamenco.com
Nevertheless, yout period of the explosion was in 70s and the beginning of the 80s, the period in which there were no festivals where your name did not appear on the posters.
Well, yes, on a popular level, it was just like you say. But later, in solitude, on a personal level, I did not have time to savour the success. I did not have peace. I sang and sand all the time. Sometimes I even thought that they would take me crazy, because after finishing a festival and going on a road, I used to tell the driver to stop the car, and I started to review or improve some verses. All of this in the middle of the night, in the open air in the countryside. I lived very quickly and very fictitiously.
And what happens with all that fortune Manuel earned in those moments? How come later these adversities came and there were no resources?
I read one, I don’t know where, that the money that was earned easily, disappears easily. And that’s the way it is. When I asked Pulpón 80 thousand pesetas for a festival, he told me that it was not possible and that even Mairena or Fasforito were not earning that much. I was very frightened in front of the audience, because the critics trashed me a lot and that obsessed me and produced me much insecurity because I was young. So, I told my agent that I wanted to charge 80 thousand pesetas, which was indeed a lot of money 25 or 30 years ago. In 70s, I got up with 20 thousand duros in my pocket and no matter how much I spent, when I went to bed, I had another 20 thousand. Which one does not even appreciates. You think yourself rich and that it would never end.
