Lucas López, Mairena ambassador in Almería (and II)

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En the previous delivery, we stopped at the Arab Cisterns, property of the City Council of Almería. Well, when Lucas López was working with the mayor in 1968, Guillermo Verdejo Vivas, entered Angel Gomez Fuentes, who chaired the Festivities Committee, with the intention of finding a solution for the Cisterns, which were in a lamentable state, a moment that Lucas took advantage of to claim it and take on the challenge that if they gave him the keys he would tidy it up and move the Peña The TarantoThat was on a Thursday, and the following Monday the conditioning began.

The works lasted more than a year, and all the reforms were paid for by the small number of members it had, since the City Council did not grant any financial aid. The work, directed by the architect Angel Jaramillo Esteban, consisted of first clearing away the rubble and then uncovering the masonry – stone cante– river and brick – as well as the vaults, whose original construction was carried out by the Arabs and intended for the city's cisterns.

However, the keys would be handed over to them by the mayor, Guillermo Verdejo, together with the president of the Festivities Commission, Ángel Gómez Fuentes, who would later become president of the Peña The Taranto.

These were, in short, the preludes to an event that marked the beginning of a period in Almería that goes beyond what the feat of its pioneers represents, both for having an evident cultural significance in the associative fabric, already in full development, and for making a hobby flourish today driven by the pleasure and taste that it provides. jondo and rubbing shoulders with the cream of the crop.

It goes without saying that, with the opening of the headquarters in the city centre, the number of members rose to almost two hundred and the recitals reached thirty a year. But continuing with what was proposed, Lucas advises the I Festival of Cante Jondo from Almeria On August 21 and 22, 1967 in the Plaza Vieja, and negotiated to the limit the most advantageous conditions for the City Council, and the following year he strengthened his friendship with Antonio Mairena at the II Festival of Cante Jondo on August 17, 1968, and the maestro has been a fixture at the Almería competition ever since.

In the seventies Lucas López signed as a critic, together with Pedro Arbide father, under the pseudonym of 'Drocas' in La Voz de Almería. And shortly after the birth of the I Week of Disclosure of the Cante JondoIt is May 1972, and Antonio Mairena, with his brother Curro Mairena and the guitar of Boy Melchior, sings for the first time in the Peña On the 19th, receiving the Taranto de Oro and the Gold Medal of the city of Almería, but in the previous ones, singers from Almería performed in his honor accompanied by a new local value, Pepín Fernández, who would become the famous Tomatito.

Lucas moved to Seville in 1973 to engage Jesus Antonio Pulpon Antonio Mairena, together with his brothers Manuel and Curro, at the Festival organized by the Peña on November 17th to raise funds for those affected by the terrible floods that occurred in Almería that autumn.

It is in May 1975 when the celebration takes place IV Week of Dissemination of the Cante Jondo. Antonio Mairena only asked Lucas for the lapel pin of the Peña Taranto had lost the team at the Feria de Abril, but he was unable to attend due to a heart problem. And it was Lucas -as generous as he was honest- who brought the shield to Seville.

«Our protagonist remains the bearer of a collective identity expressed in musical values. He was the one who picked up the thread of local history to enrich the key documents that came later with meanings and symbols. He was the one who simultaneously marked the beats of the process of flamenco culture in Almería with the task of disarming those who questioned the notions of common sense»

But the idea that pursued Lucas was to take Antonio Mairena to “his” Peña, as Antonio called her. And being president Ricardo Perez Muro (1977), Antonio sang on February 26, 1977 in El Taranto with his brother Curro and the guitar of Ricardo Minho. It should be remembered, in this regard, that, upon his return to Seville, Antonio had an accident. He returned to Almería and when everything was back to normal, Lucas called Faustino the Taxi Driver, who moved him to Seville.

Under the presidential mandate of Marcos Rubio de Bustos (1980 and 1981), Lucas, the councilor Fernando Navarrete y Antonio Zapata, they requested in Fuengirola the celebration of IX Congress of Flamenco Activities for Almería, which would be held from September 17 to 19, where our good friend served as vice president.

Antonio Mairena was named Honorary President in perpetuity at that congress, receiving the Medal of Merit at Work in its Silver category with oak branches, awarded by the Ministry on April 30, 1980 and imposed by the president of the Andalusian Government, Raphael Escudero. Also at that congress the Social Institution for the Third Age of Artists Flamencos (ITEAF), with Lucas López taking over as vice president.

Back in 1982, Lucas, already president of the Peña Taranto would also assume the presidency of the ITEAF (1982-1993), an institution to which he was committed until its dissolution at the assembly held in Seville on November 27, 1993. Likewise, his commitment to the flamenco He joined in February 1983 as a member of the Board of Directors of the Department of Flamenco of the Junta de Andalucía, and three months later he receives the Medal of the Order of Mairenismo in Antonio Mairena's last performance at the Peña The Taranto, his last public recital and broadcast throughout Spain by Spanish Radio Station with Pedro PeñaIt was on May 14th during the XII Week of Cante Jondo, in which Antonio received the Golden Indalo, symbol of Almería, awarded by the mayor of the city, Santiago Martínez.

A few days later, Lucas invited him to spend some time in Almería. And there he was with his sister Rosario – great Rosary y Angeles!– and his niece Charo for ten days. Then, on September 2 and 3, Lucas returned the visit as a member of the jury of the Mairena del Alcor Competition, noticing at the farewell, in his house in Padre Pedro Ayala, a decline in his health and in his state of mind, so much so that on the fifth of that month the master of the Alcores would die.

Lucas was deeply affected by Antonio's death. So much so that, in our weekly conversations until his death in August 2014, he always had him on his lips. They were the branches of the tree of our lived history.

It seemed only fair to me, therefore, to now remember such an illustrious Almerian on the occasion of the centenary of his birth. Apart from the bond that united us, because he was an unavoidable reference and a vital instrument for the empowerment of the Mairenism, since it forged a process in which spatial, temporal and social relations interacted, the three links of the feeling of identity.

But far from boxing up the autochthonous with his farewell, our protagonist continues to be the bearer of a collective identity expressed in musical values. He was the one who picked up the thread of local history to enrich the key documents that came later with meanings and symbols. He was the one who simultaneously marked the beats of the process of flamenco culture in Almería with the task of disarming those who questioned the notions of common sense.

And ten years after his farewell, we continue to maintain the thesis that, if the sense of belonging to Mairena has been crucial in the life of Lucas López, it is because he dedicated his entire life to linking the flamenco identity of Antonio Mairena with the culture of Almería.