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Thanks to his extraordinary talent, a childish event could be transformed into the subject of a song.
A classic like “This afternoon I saw it rain” from 1967 did not originate from a broken heart, but from a feeling of loneliness. Armando Manzanero, who died at the age of 85, received a payment and with that money he wanted to go to a restaurant with the family. For various reasons, nobody could accompany him. He contacted a friend and couldn’t. “Then I sit alone to eat something and outside there is a downpour.” As he dined and the water fell relentlessly, people began to run. That was when the verses arrived. “This afternoon I saw it rain, I saw people running, and you weren’t there.”
For the late writer and journalist Carlos Monsiváis, the figure of Manzanero only shelters singularities, armed with “an unexpected voice, without the decorative impetus of the tenors”. Barely one meter and 54 centimeters tall and devoid of the physical qualities of the gallant, the Mexican star born on December 7, 1935 in Mérida, Yucatán, conquered as standard-bearer of bolero and ballads the greatest hits in the memory of several generations, and the greatest honors in the music industry. He composed more than half a thousand songs with some fifty classified as hits, several of them irrefutable classics of Latin American romantic music such as Somos novios and Contigo Learned. Among many awards and tributes, the honorary Grammy awarded in 2014 by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States stands out. On that same day, the other winners were The Beatles.
“The site of Manzanero is irrefutably occupied by Manzanero,” declared Monsivais and they were not only words of good parenting for his friend. The Mexican developed a career so far unrepeatable and transversal on the artistic map. An extraordinarily successful composer and performer, he met and dominated different instances of the music business. He exerted the production, the leadership in record labels and the presidency of the Society of authors and composers of Mexico, jealously watching over the rights of the artists.
Coming from a home where music was his father’s trade, at the age of eight he entered the School of Fine Arts in Mérida. His influences came from both classical authors and romantic pioneers, including Juventino Rosas, Lorenzo Barcelata, and Consuelo Velásquez, the author of Bésame mucho. “If one day one could think about what my music is like, it looks like Chopin, it looks like Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven. Why? Because it’s the music that I listened to, that I grew up with ”.
Although his first composition Never in the world dates back to 1950, Armando Manzanero’s professional career began in 1957 as a pianist in Mérida (“the piano has always been the love of my life”), to later settle in Mexico City and work soon with the greatest, among them Lucho Gatica (for whom he composed the hit I will turn off the light), Pedro Vargas and José José. At the same time, he was introduced to the world of labels as musical director of CBS.
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When he was already a consecrated one among the greatest musical names in our language after launching great stars like Angélica María in the 60s, his own hits, and winning festivals in the 70s and 80s, his career took a second wind in 1991 when producing Romance by Luis Miguel, the first of four Sun King tribute albums with phenomenal sales, paying homage to the romantic song of yesteryear along with presenting the boleros to young audiences. According to Manzanero, “they were not new songs. Not a song was new, but 30, 40 years ago ”.
Indeed, the compositions date from Unforgettable from 1944 to 1986, the year Manzanero wrote the super hit No sé tú. As of 2013 records, the album has sold seven million copies worldwide.
In recent years, Manzanero has oscillated between reproaches, criticism and compliments towards Luis Miguel. “It is easier for an elephant to enter through the eye of a needle than for Luis Miguel to do something for his neighbor.” The 2017 quote had a context. Manzanero was saddened by the absence of the singer in a tribute concert that was rendered to him in February of that year. He also reviewed it for leaving the touted tour with Alejandro Fernández. “He left a great man badly (…) What can be expected of him? He went crazy”.
In 2018 the discourse radically changed. “I would always like to compose for Luis Miguel, of course, of course! (…) He is in his best moment”. That same year, with the premiere of Luis Miguel’s series on Netflix, he expressed dissatisfaction with his representation as he explained to the newspaper El Comercio de Peru, discarding having doubted the success of the boleros. “On the contrary, I was certain that this was going to change Luis Miguel.” He didn’t like the look either. “I was very sorry that they took me out dressed like that, I am a man who always dresses with all the formalities in the world.”
Last October, in an interview with The Associated Press, Manzanero put his work with Luis Miguel in perspective. “The ‘Romances’ he did are one of the works that left me the best flavor (…) one also has to speak of benefit, as a composer, in order to handle a talent of that size. I am very proud to have done all that ”.
Married five times, father of seven children and grandfather of 16 grandchildren, a tennis fan with two games played a week until he was in his eighties, Armando Manzanero did not give much credit to the myth of innate talent, nor the inspiration as epicenters of a great artist. “The genius of the composer occupies 25% and the rest is to insist, look for someone to record you. Don’t be disappointed when they tell you they don’t like your song. “
As a connoisseur of different facets of the music industry in his multiple roles as a composer, singer and executive, Armando Manzanero was particularly clear about the relationship between author and artist, and the ups and downs of egos. “An interpreter is looking for his success every day (…) the vast majority of times he says ‘the one with the success is me, I sang it (…)’. So one has to know that this is a business. It is the same case of groups, duets, that suddenly separate because there is no lack of an asshole who says ‘no, it is that the interpreter is you, the other is overshadowing you (…)’. This is a business and if we’re doing well, even if I don’t like you, on stage I’ll hug you ”.
Another of the rules that shaped the validity that it held during its career, consisted of keeping up to date with genres and interpreters. “I was always worried about the new generations recording me. I never had that distance that there is sometimes from the composers who found very strong success, and then they do not take into account the people who are in fashion ”.
Under that constancy, Manzanero became a great among the greats, perpetuating his name. “I feel very satisfied, especially of transcending generations. Because there are many who had enormous success, so and so sang them. But when a person has the luck and the ability to transcend, one already feels touched by the hand of God ”.
About the future of romantic music he was absolutely optimistic. Since he was a child he was aware of the constant onslaught of new genres while ballads defy time. “They all arrive, pass, succeed and leave. Nothing else is good music. Do you think that Mozart, if he lived, would worry that reggaeton exists? Good music stays forever. And a man like me (…) who cares about everything else ”.
If he didn’t care about fashions and the eventual dent in the romantic song, he wasn’t worried about climbing just over five feet. Armando Manzanero laughed because he had a letter with which he wrote his legend. “How can a fucking guy who is 1.54 tall be a gallant? Where I won and I fucked all the 1.80 and very handsome ones, it was at the piano ”.
