Juana la Macarrona

[4][5][6] Juana landed her first regular job at a café cantante in Sevilla, but she earned more in the streets by the equivalent of "passing the hat".

The people are silent, holding their breaths with an almost religious fervor, while the feet of La Macarrona give rhythm to her dance.

By eye-witness accounts La Macarrona was "a fireball, her dance full of gypsy temperament."

Juana "es la que hace muchos años reina en el arte de bailer flamenco".

[24] In particular at the Cafe Novedades in Sevilla for fifteen years she held sway, setting the pace, defining the art.

Four well-known traveling companions saw her dance, circa 1917: the impresario Serge Diaghilev, the composer Manuel de Falla, the choreographer and dancer Léonide Massine, and the bailaor Felix Fernandez García.

Her namesake Tío Juan Macarrón of Jerez de la Frontera is described as being a cantaor (flamenco singer) of 18th-century Spain and "Uno de más antiguos intérpreters conocidos" (One of the earliest flamenco interpreters known).

In addition to the foods, the word "macaroni" in 18th century England also signified an "English dandy... who affected foreign mannerisms and fashions.

"[33] This second meaning originally derived from Italian, and is retained in the Spanish cognate "macarronea" [English: "macarronic"], which currently is defined as "burlesque verse" mixing "real or coined words from two or more languages.

"Such was her dominance in the dance that in the 1920s, when she was in her sixties, she still drew crowds as a headliner in the major cabarets of Sevilla and Madrid.

[40] Eventually, however, her cafés-cantantes era fame had faded; she then mostly performed in colmaos (flamenco taverns) and ventas in Sevilla.

"Ni en los cafés nos quieren ya, cuando hemos sío siempre las reinas der mundo.

This event, promoted by composer Manuel de Falla and poet Federico García Lorca, was chiefly a contest for amateur flamenco artists, but it also attracted veteran performers.

"][45][46] Later the maestra herself danced, to a trio of guitarists including Ramón Montoya, while the young Manolo Caracol sang, and Gitanas of the Sacromonte punctuated the music with their palmas.

A bailaora herself, she turned her admiring gaze to La Macarrona as she performed the flamenco arts.

[49] In 1933 Manuel de Falla's ballet composition El Amor Brujo (Love the Magician) was re-staged in Cádiz, accentuating its flamenco roots.

Produced by Encarnación López (La Argentinita), it "stressed the folkloric elements of the music and, as a result, was more 'flamenco' than other versions.

The show starred flamenco dancers Vicente Escudero, Pilar López, Rafael Ortega, Antonio de Triana, as well as La Argentinita.

After opening in Cádiz (de Falla's birthplace), La Macarrona with the other brujas went on the show's tour of Spain.

[56] During those years the two elder gypsy dancers were being celebrated as "the most famous in the grand old style of the jondo dance."

Both "full of years and infirmities" they were yet "basking in the admiration and homage of the Sevilla public, that loved them dearly.

It was a dream: they had come back to life in the person of Carmen.In the "magic circle of flamenco art" a new star began to shine.

[59][60] In 1933 and again in 1940, La Macarrona toured with the celebrated stage show "Las Calles de Cádiz" (The Streets of Cadiz).

[63] In Las Calles de Cádiz, "the colorful life of the barrio Santa María" was brought to the stage.

The flamenco artists played a variety of city characters, while occasionally performing the art's song and dance accompanied by guitarists.

This Cádiz barrio was then an entertainment spot, with "tiendas de montañés (grocery store-bar combinations) open all night" and streets full of aficionados.

"Los niños modernos, la juventú, nos mira como cosas raras, sin pensá que hemos jecho yorá con nuestras gitanerías a tre generaciones.

"[68] Yet a decade later the flamenco arts were experiencing a grand renaissance, in which Juana Vargas as La Macarrona was well remembered.

Years earlier, in 1935, Ferdinando el de Triana, a flamenco cantaor, had written: "Everything that can be said about La Macarrona is not enough.