Influenced by singers like Antonio Chacón, he carried to the extreme the tendency to a more mellow and ornamented style of flamenco singing.

[2] Both his singing style and public attitudes were widely imitated at the time, to the extent that the period has often been identified as the era of marchenismo.

Pepe Marchena started working in menial jobs as boy, alternating them with live performances in taverns for a few coins, until he won a contest for amateurs in Fuentes de Andalucía.

In 1922, one year after his successful début in Madrid, he started singing in Teatro La Latina, with a 200 pesetas daily salary, a large sum at the time.

Also in 1922, he made his first recording, and took part in the show Málaga, ciudad bravía at Teatro Martín, with guitarist Ramón Montoya.

In June, he sang for the King and Queen of Italy during their visit to Spain, together with Antonio Chacón, Pastora Imperio, La Niña de los Peines and Manuel Escacena.

In 1950 he accomplished a rare achievement for flamenco singers at the time: he started a tour in Morocco and Algeria, which was followed by concerts in Paris.

In 1974, he received an homage in his hometown of Marchena, where singers like Juan Valderrama and Perlita de Huelva took part.

In 1976, already ill with cancer, he received the Gold Medal of Marchena and Juan Valderrama organized a festival in his benefit, with the participation of several artists.

Although he has usually been considered as one of the prototypical non-Gypsy flamenco singers, Manuel de Falla, a lover of Gypsy singing, said of him: "In the Niño de Marchena, with the crystal clear pureness of a mountain spring, we find the inexhaustible charm of the authentic Andalusian singing, without the obstacles that diminish it when it is locked up in futile songs.

"[5] And Leopold Stokowsky affirmed: "Niño de Marchena has the emotion of the plain chant expressed by a genius interpreter.

His style had to be more convincing in minor genres: the fandango and the fandanguillo, the airs coming form America, the less heavy songs from Málaga and Eastern Andalusia...

He imposed the "pretty" style of singing based on trills and warbles, falsetto and ornaments; he took "personal creation" to the extreme, to the point of feeding eighty per cent of the ópera flamenca; he introduced reciting, another innovation with abominable sequels; he invented mixtures of styles that have never been tried before... Marchena's heterodoxy is obvious.

Untransferable, in some way, even if an army of imitators followed him and succeeded in the times of "marchenismo", and took his school to pure plagiarism with no creativity, to a real cul-de-sac.

[6] During the 1990s, together with a certain revival of the cantes de ida y vuelta and a reappreciation of the ópera flamenca period, his figure came back into favour for a significant part of the critics, artists and flamenco public.

His influence was claimed by several outstanding singers, including Enrique Morente, Mayte Martín or Arcángel.

A clear example is Álvarez Caballero himself who, only two years after writing the words quoted above, directed a partial compilation of his recordings (Un monumento al cante, Quejío collection, EMI, 1997), with an introductory leaflet in which he stated: A singer of delicate ornaments, in the styles from Málaga and Eastern Andalusia he excelled especially with a convincing expressive quality.

Later, however, marchenismo gradually gained prestige, and nowadays we have the impression that flamencologist and serious flamenco lovers increasingly value his work.

1, Fods, 1995 Comments and audio samples in Flamenco-world.com El Niño de Marchena: primeras grabaciones.

Contains lecture offered on February 28, 1972 by Pepe Marchena at the University of Seville', together with songs in diverse flamenco styles.

Datos extraidos del Diccionario Flamenco de Jose Blas Vega y Manuel Rios Ruiz Cinterco – 1985".

Ríos Ruiz, Manuel: El gran libro del flamenco, Vol II: interpreters, Calambur, Madrid, 2002 ISBN 978-84-88015-95-2 Rodó Sellés, Ramón.

"La figura de Pepe Marchena vista desde el siglo XXI" (PDF).