Today we write almost everything with double or triple admiration. And any brilliant talent we call a genius. Daily exaggerations that recover their dimension when talking about a Manuel Alejandro. Deserving of the most absolute multiple admiration. And to be recognized as a true genius. If it is about songs, it is not risky to affirm that He is the largest living (and still active) composer in the entire Spanish-speaking world.
His are titles like ‘I try to forget you’, ‘I’m a rebel’, ‘Our love was broken’, ‘Manuela’, ‘I’m that one’, ‘Tell me about the sea, sailor’, ‘As I love you’, ‘I’m going to lose your head for your love’, ‘Don’t let the night break’, ‘Lady’, ‘Face to face’, ‘What does nobody know’, ‘Say what they say’… About 600 songs with absolute classics by the dozens and hits by the hundreds.
Emperor of the melodic song; or sentimental or romantic or whatever you call it. No matter how many wonderful signatures the genre has given, his is already like a divine commandment written in fire on stone. Gabriel García Márquez himself claimed him as one of the greatest existing poets in Spanish and lamented how much the intelligentsia ignored him.. It is assumed that things have been changing, but in 2021, the illusions that so many had put into being awarded the Princess of Asturias Award for the Arts were parked. Will they fail again this time in the worst sense of the term?
Manuel Alejandro turns 90 this Monday, February 21; although in many places it appears a day before. Nothing out of tune in someone who has always known very little. In all of Latin America he is revered as we could not even imagine here. In Spain, his name sounds like a legend and his songs resonate like few others in the collective memory. But for decades he has maintained an aura of mystery. Away from the spotlight. Without being seen except at very specific moments…. Like the current one.
For some time here there have been crowds of tributes and media receptions with his presence. Affable and with the wise speech of someone who has drunk both from high culture and from popular artistic manifestations. And he has mixed them without prejudice.
We were recently able to see him at the epicenter of mainstream television: ‘El Hormiguero’. And last week he gave Carlos Herrera a precious exclusive: will perform next April 2 at the Teatro Real in an unprecedented format. Singing his songs as he showed them to the performers who have universalized them. Telling things about them and accompanying himself on the piano. The black bull of him, who calls him.
A date for a history that goes back to the Second Republic. In Jerez de la Frontera. Manuel Álvarez-Beigbeder Pérez was born there. Manuel Alejandro would put it in part to differentiate himself from his father, the famous classical composer. And also in line with how fashionable compound names were then: Bob Dylan, Roberto Carlos or Víctor Manuel type.
Of ancestors like the Mendizábal of the confiscation and Andalusian blood mixed with Alpine. Such a distinguished birthplace of his did not prevent him from frequenting other neighborhoods, since he lived a stone’s throw from the most gypsy Jerez, where the best flamenco on the street was the daily bread.
He was going for a classical musician until he realized that devoting himself to song allowed him to enjoy life in a different way at the same time. And apart from his immense and versatile melodic talent, a huge lyricist emerged with that decision. Able to find more and more phrases that have resulted in colloquial expressions. In addition, he is almost always in charge of the orchestrations and production.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNgIHikHg_U
Related news
Installed in Madrid, after several years as a whorehouse pianist, the encounter with a very young Raphael changed both lives. For no one has he composed as much as for himself, although the number of performers with whom he has worked closely on both sides of the Atlantic is unparalleled. Among many others: Rocío Jurado, José José, Julio Iglesias, Jeanette, José Luis Rodríguez El Puma, Emmanuel, Luis Miguel, Plácido Domingo, Isabel Pantoja, Marisol, Falete… To whom none other than Alejandro Sanz joined a few months ago, who breaks with one of his songs, the excellent ‘Y ya te Quiero…’, his habit of recording only his own repertoire. And it is that Manuel Alejandro was the godfather of his baptism, because of the friendship that he then had with his father. However, the work, the continuous commissions and often an entire ocean distanced them, and they have not known each other until very recently.
Between reunions and recognitions, this last year has also given him the most painful blow he has ever suffered. On March 9, 2021, his wife, Purificación Casas, died of the coronavirus.. Also known as Ana Magdalena, the firm that appears alongside Manuel Alejandro in so many successes. Neither his biography nor his work would be understood without it. He always considered his judgment more than anyone else’s. He helped her sort through his ideas as the best editors tend to do with novelists. Bastion of his art and his life.