Nino Bravo and non-Valencian-language album

As recorded by the biographer, Dario Ledesma in the book Nino Bravo, voice and heart, the singer described in an interview with the newspaper in February 1972 City What He intended to record “a complete album in Valencian language”. A few weeks ago, in an interview, this time with Heraldo de Aragón, Nino revealed that he has two projects that he wants to realize “even if the results are regular”. «The first – explained to journalist María Consuelo Reyna in December 1971 -, record a Valencian folklore song, but really Valencia, Which is very different from what is said in Valencian. The second is even riskier: recording an LP of classical songs just as they were created, without any modern arrangement.

a changing relationship

Ledesma notes in his book that the professional relationship of Luis Manuel Llopis (the singer’s real name) with the Valencian man has changed over time. According to the biographer, Nino’s first public mention of the possibility of recording songs in his mother tongue was in January 1971, admitting that he did not take this into account and always planned to sing in Spanish. Weeks later, in another interview, the artist explained that singing in Valencian would “limit my market”. At home, although I speak Valencian to my parents, I feel and think in Spanish, so I speak Spanish, my country’s language, to communicate with my people”.

Subsequent interviews that Ledesma saved reflect how the translator of “My Land” reevaluated this position. “I will probably go crazy one day and sing. If I sang in Valencian, it would be because of the arrogance of being Valencian as others do. I can sing in Valencian, but our language is Spanish,” he explained to Diez Minutos in September 1971. In December of that year he announced an album of traditional Valencian songs, and in February 1972 an album entirely in Valencian. None of these projects was finally realized.

“Divine” with Chops

Nino Bravo had the opportunity to sing in his mother tongue on stage, and in a meaningful situation. It was in the middle of the Fallas festival in March 1973, and it was his last performance in Valencia. The artist was hired to headline one of the famous evenings at the Parador So Nelo. Among the people were the city’s biggest criminals, the mayor Vicente López Rosat, the president of Valencia CF Francisco Ros Casares and a few stars of the team.

Nino Bravo recalls Ledesma, “he wanted to pleasantly surprise the audience and, taking advantage of the presence of all officials, planned to interpret the “Valencia Hymn” as a thank you to the audience that supported him in his country many times. At that time, with the dictatorship of Franco slowly dying out, “There was still a certain pressure on the use of regional languages. The hymns were sung in Spanish, the official language of the State. But Nino wanted that night to be unique… He wanted to sing the hymn in his native language.”

The problem is, Nino didn’t know the Valencian words well, so she asked her brother-in-law, Fernando, to write it down for him on a piece of paper he kept in his black velvet suit pocket. yield. “After almost fifty minutes of performance – the biographer – Nino took a piece of paper from his pocket and began to sing the first lines of a very emotional song a cappella. “To offer Spain new glories together, Germans, Vingau …”. The “Valencian Hymn” was the bright climax a night like this needed! Everyone present energetically rose from their seats and cheered wildly for several minutes, which prevented him from retiring and kept him on stage until the popular clamor had subsided.

Adaptation for Lo Rat Penat

However, this wasn’t the first time Nino Bravo sang in public in Valencian. In a book published in 2010, Valencian editor and activist Enric Tarrega wrote “The first songs in Catalan, Nino Bravo, and another singer, Josep Bosch, a doctor in Grao (in Valencia), recorded Nino’s songs. Well done Catalan. Nino Bravo sent them to Edigsa but they ignored him.

This, along with the nuances, is a confirmation that it can be real. Josep Bosch, named after Tarrega, was not a doctor, but as a young man, he was the guitarist for Los Supperson (or Superson), a band in which Bravo was a singer before his successful solo career. In an interview published by this newspaper in 2010, and also in another conversation with Darío Ledesma last year, Bosch He has confirmed that Los Supperson has adapted his repertoire into the Valencian language at least a few times.

“When we play in the theater Lo Rat Penat, We sing all our songs in Valencian – Bosch maintained in 2022-. We sang songs of other artists, for example Shadows, which Vicente and I translated. joyfulwe are also moving alziraall in Valencian. I think someone recorded the performance at Lo Rat Penat and the tape was sent to Edigsa record label. Someone must have that tape; I tried to find him, but no luck so far.”

This recording appears to no longer exist (if it was made), but the “Els Suppersons” concert at the Lo Rat Penat headquarters has a schedule and indeed a few songs appear to be named in Valencian. This performance must have been made in 1964 or 1965, as it appears behind a photograph stored in the Nino Bravo Museum in Aielo de Malferit.

On the other hand, Vicente López, another member of Nino Bravo’s band, who also accompanied him during his solo stage, assured Ledesma in 2010 that he did not remember that “they did the performances entirely in Valencian and a recording was sent”. Edigsa”. I don’t know this and I’m surprised I don’t remember it. I don’t remember Nino singing in Valencian”.