Great Masters of Flamenco, Vol. 18

Volume 18 highlights Rafael Romero, a native of Andujar in the province of Jaen, where there is now a street named for him. Romero was given the childhood nickname ''El Gallina,'' because he never stopped singing the children's song, La gallina papanata. At the end of the Civil War, he went to Madrid and met the great guitarist Perico el del Lunar who had an enormous influence on him; Romero began singing from one tablao to another, finally settling in at ''La Zambra.'' He toured abroad in the dance troupes of Vicente Escudero, Teresa and Luisillo, Antonio and then Jose Greco, and regularly appeared at the Parisian flamenco restaurant 'Le Catalan', where he sang before Picasso, Cocteau, Dali, Montherlant. Among the prizes he was awarded, the most prestigious were the Biennale of Flamenco Art in Seville and the National Cante Prize of the Catedra de Flamencologia y Estudios folkloricos andaluces.