It\u2019s a fact of life that many talented flamenco artists spend their lives working and sacrificing to perfect their art, hoping to make a respectable living from it, although the majority never become major figures. Others manage to achieve a certain amount of success, only to be completely forgotten after having performed throughout the world.<\/p>\n
This is my brief but sincere tribute to one of those forgotten interpreters. I fell in love with the voice of Manuela Cauqui Ben\u00edtez, \u201cManolita de Jerez\u201d, around 1962 when I heard her on a recording with the Jos\u00e9 Greco dance company. In the early sixties I was able to buy records of flamenco singing at a store on New York\u2019s 14th Street called Casa Moneo, which is where I discovered the Jos\u00e9 Greco recording with Manolita\u2019s haunting sound. Her vocal placement and powerful delivery were reminiscent of Paquera, but then her ability to draw the voice inwards seemed to recall La Ni\u00f1a de los Peines. Add to that an oriental sort of twang, the comp\u00e1s of Jerez, the influence of don Antonio Chac\u00f3n, and it was an irresistibly flamenco recipe.<\/p>\n
Yet so forgotten was this singer in recent times, that when I brought her name up at a roundtable discussion with experts on the flamenco singing of Jerez, they assured me there was no such artist from this city, and that certainly it had to be someone wanting to bask in the glory of assuming the sobriquet \u201cde Jerez\u201d. Further investigation however, revealed Manolita could not have been more from Jerez, with roots in both the Santiago neighborhood, where she was born, and San Miguel, where she later lived very near Paquera\u2019s birthplace, in addition to spending her final years in the La Plata neighborhood.<\/p>\n
Manolita\u2019s father worked in a typical Jerez \u201ctabanco\u201d where people gathered to drink wine and share cante. Her mother and sisters are said to have been very good singers. At the age of 15, she sang at the Villamarta theater in Jerez, and at 18, recorded several popular songs accompanied by Manuel Bonet on guitar, although in the Diccionario Enciclop\u00e9dico Ilustrado del Flamenco, Juan Gonz\u00e1lez N\u00fa\u00f1ez \u201cTriguito\u201d is described as \u201cthe favored guitarist of Manolita de Jerez\u201d. In these recordings you don\u2019t really detect the enormous capacity and flamenco power Manolita would deliver only a few years later, when Jos\u00e9 Greco signed her up to sing for his newly-formed company.<\/p>\n
Greco had a good eye for talent: the singers who followed Manolita in the company in later years when she could not continue performing due to illness, were Pepe de Algeciras (with his brother Paco de Luc\u00eda), followed by Juan Vallejo (nephew of Manuel, and not to be confused with singer Juan Torres, who also went by the name \u201cJuan Vallejo\u201d) and Pepe de la Isla among others.<\/p>\n
Manolita de Jerez sings for Greco in two well-known films: in 1956,\u00a0Around the World in Eighty Days<\/i>, and in 1965,\u00a0Ship of Fools<\/i>. She can also be heard on at least two long-play records with the famous dancer:\u00a0Flamenco Fury<\/i>\u00a0(1958), and\u00a0Noche de Flamenco<\/i>\u00a0(1959) where she sings grana\u00edna, milonga, serrana, malague\u00f1a, alegr\u00edas and guajira. I remember the milonga \u201cGuadalupe de mi Alma\u201d as being especially moving, but have been unable to track down the audio.<\/p>\n
Manolita was considered an excellent singer of saetas. In his book \u201cGran Libro del Flamenco\u201d, (Vol. 1, p. 277), Manuel R\u00edos Ruiz includes her name in a short list of saeta experts along with Manuel Torre, Isabelita de Jerez, El Gloria and other legendary interpreters. In Madrid, she performed alongside Rafael Farina and Porrina de Badajoz.<\/p>\n
By the age of 50 a rare infection that would eventually leave her sightless, caused her to return to Spain after decades in the United States. She was born in 1925, and although I was unable to find the precise date of her passing, there are references to the late 1980s. The popular songs you\u2019ll find at Youtube don\u2019t do her justice, but do take a moment to listen to these amazing fandangos accompanied by Ni\u00f1o Ricardo, especially the second one, a style whose creation is disputed to this day by respective supporters of Juan Varea and Ni\u00f1o Le\u00f3n, and to which Manolita gives a highly personal interpretation:<\/p>\n
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