Uranium’s album-winning singer Raphael says he’ll know when to retire and doesn’t want to be cloned

Miguel Rafael Martos Sánchez, known simply as Raphael, will return to Argentina on March 7 to present his “Victoria Tour” with a show at the Movistar Arena. Or what amounts to saying, he will present six decades of great songs in a three-hour ride.

The Nightingale of Linares smiles from overseas, and even the zoom lights up despite the ocean mass and the time difference. It’s hard to imagine that this guy is already 80 years old and that he will be 81 at the time of his show in Buenos Aires (he will turn 81 on March 5). But will he really have them?

-Do you still say every May 5th that you’re turning 23? It’s an old habit of yours.

-No not anymore. I do not do it anymore. I will now be twenty-one… My birthday is now April 1st. And this is when I turn 21. What do you think? I’ve been saying this since I had the transplant, obviously.

On April 1, 2003 and after a long and agonizing wait (the doctors were pessimistic), the singer received a liver transplant, following liver cirrhosis that had put him on the verge of dying. Since then he says his second life has begun. And with good reason.

-Does the fact that your new tour is called “Victoria Tour” have anything to do with your return to life?

-It has to do with everything. Everything that happened to me had to do with that name. Victory is my victory over life, it’s not how many think of a woman’s name. Look, after seeing the family that I have, the friends that I have, the audience that I have, the years that I’ve been doing this, the voice as it is, I had to call it Victoria, yes or yes.

-I was reading an article in which you said that you will never leave the stage, that they will have to carry you forward…

– Hell, not that much. I will know when I should stay at home and continue with my private life. I consider that my life is dedicated to the service of this profession and I will fulfill it until the end, but as long as my voice is as good as it is now.

An escape to the Soviet Union

Three hours straight at a show and without drinking a single glass of water is not for everyone. For Raphael yes. He demonstrated this for the last time in his previous visit to Argentina, with his show at Luna Park, on May 14, 2022. Of course, don’t ask for an encore because El Niño doesn’t like these things. When it ends, it ends.

Let’s imagine, just to cite a record, that this man circled the entire planet Earth, singing, a dozen times…

-In all these years, more than sixty of your career, you have shared moments with great jet set figures, statesmen, presidents. Who influenced you the most?

-I was lucky enough to know two Popes, and yes, almost all heads of state, even kings. But what moved me most was meeting my audience, who is always present year after year. It’s a miracle what’s happening to me right now. I’ve been singing for five generations! And this excites me so much…

-So much so that on your first tour through the then Soviet Union, to see your Russian audience you had to leave Franco’s Spain almost secretly. How did you do it?

-Think, it was forbidden to go. But they made me go through Paris, there they gave me another passport and that’s how I entered. I did about eight tours in the USSR. From my third film onwards, Whatever they say, the emotion was such that they started calling me from all over. I went to St. Petersburg, which was then Leningrad, and stayed there for forty days. And also in Moscow.

The year was 1971 and No European artist had managed to cross the Iron Curtain.. Not even the Beatles or even the Rolling Stones. But the USSR Minister of Culture had seen the film and was admired by Raphael’s personality. The EFE agency described those recitals this way:

“In front of the large auditorium that filled the Sports Hall, last night the Spaniard Raffaello, very popular in the USSR, made his debut. The majority of women, and not just teenagers, enthusiastically applauded the songs of the recital. there is only one ticket left for the remaining shows and retailers are offering some for twenty-five rubles a seat”.

-The movie “Say What They Say” was filmed in Argentina, right?

-Of course, and I have wonderful memories. Among other things because, in addition to Buenos Aires, I had the pleasure of shooting in Bariloche, which is a paradise. And it was a sensational hit song too.

-Even though you weren’t an actor, you seemed very loose in your films.

-Well, I’ve always been very loose with everything. I’m not one of those people who relaxes afraid. There’s a little secret and that is that I feel at home on stage.

The stars he missed knowing

-There were two great singing stars you were about to meet and that didn’t happen. The first was Edith Piaf. What happened?

-Well, he’s dead. He got sick, there was a recital for the Fallas of Valencia (the Fallas are the most famous festivals in Spain) in March and they hired me to sing in the same show. And they sent the singer and actress Juliette Gréco, another big star of the time, to replace her.

After two or three years I went to make my debut at the Olympia in Paris and I was lucky enough to see Edith Piaf’s world, her dressing room, and it was as if she were there.

-The other big star was Judy Garland.

-Yes, it was in London in 1969. Every year I did a month-long season there in a theater, the Talk of the Town, and very important artists always came, like Frank Sinatra, Sammy David Jr., Judy herself.

The third year they called me from the theater and asked me if I had prepared the concert. I was surprised, because I debuted two weeks later, but they said, “Well, you debut this Monday, because Judy Garland just died.” I didn’t even have time to rehearse or anything. Luckily I had it prepared in Madrid.

-You also participated in “The Ed Sullivan Show”, the most famous program on American television.

-Well, that Ed Sullivan thing… I went to sing there twice. It’s just that great people, and he was, are always great at everything and make you have a good time.

-However you were not the first Hispanic singer to go. First there was Joselito, a Spanish child prodigy.

-Yes, of course, Joselito. But I don’t remember seeing it because I was little. And after me there was Rita Pavone, and before that Elvis Presley, the Beatles.

-And did you meet the Beatles or Elvis?

-Yes. Only the Beatles. I met them here in Madrid. Because my manager at the time was one of the ones who brought them (July 1, 1965, a historic visit) and I was at the Ritz Hotel with them and their manager. Very beautiful… and very large.

Calderón de la Barca and a discovery

-There’s an anecdote of yours that says that as a child you went on horseback to see a work by Calderón de la Barca, and this marked you forever.

-Yes, I have been singing since I was four years old. They put me in that school because they had a choir and I had a nice voice, so I went in as a soloist. Until then my dreams were focused on music. But once, riding through the city, I saw a theater company. They were offering themselves Life is a dreamand I practically fell off my horse.

Then I decided that I would not be one of those watching the show, but that I would be the show itself.

-I mention two names: Marcel Vivancos and Rafael Granados…

-Two of my childhood friends. Hahaha. I gave myself those fancy names to sing on the radio as a kid. The presenters themselves suggested it to me. It was sung over the phone, so they couldn’t see your face. So I showed up and they liked it so much that when they hung up they said, “Hey, show up again, every week. “Just change your name.”

And then I changed my name and so I earned a few pesetas and a bottle of Cola-Cao… Hahaha (Cola Cao was a product made in Barcelona similar to Toddy).

-Is it true that as a child they called you Falín, after Rafaelín?

– My mother called me that, more than anything else. Her name was Raffaella. And so as not to compete with him I was Falín.

-Your father was a big football fan, but you weren’t so much, right?

-Every two Sundays my father took me to the Metropolitano (then the old Atlético Madrid stadium). He was a total “colchonero”. And he’ll tell you something…

At the first recital I give at the Santiago Bernabéu (Real Madrid stadium) the president of the club arrives and gives me a gold and diamond medal. And I looked at the sky and said: “Dad, here I am, just as you would have wanted… Only I’m not at Aleti, but at Real Madrid”. Hahaha. I never knew what my father, who was already dead, poor thing, would feel.

-Are you satisfied with “My Big Night”, the film by Alex de la Iglesia?

-Yes, Alex is very good. I was lucky enough to shoot with very prestigious directors. Three films with Mario Camus, three more with Vicente Escrivá, then with De la Iglesia. Let’s see if I was lucky.

-Would you like to be cloned, so as to always have a Raphael at hand?

– Hell, I hope not. Why would you clone me if I’m still alive?!

The uranium disk

On Wikipedia, in a sea of ​​statements impossible to compare, there is a surprising fact: the Uranium Record is a special prize awarded in 1980 by the Hispavox record label together with the SGAE (General Society of Authors and Publishers) to the singer Raffaele in recognition of the 50 million copies sold of his entire discographyAll over the world.

It is assumed that this award was also awarded to Queen and Michael Jackson, but there is no tangible evidence of this.

-Is this true about the uranium disk? Exists?

-It exists, yes, and it is in my museum in the city of Linares, where I was born. By the way, a month and a half ago I took my first car there. that Escrivá had given it to me right when we shot the film The Gulf (1969)

-What car is it?

-A Lincoln Continental. The same car Kennedy was in when he was killed.

-And is it true that you sang during the earthquake and didn’t realize it?

-Yes! She was in Mexico City, Mexico. My director, poor guy, signaled to me that everything was moving and I didn’t understand and kept singing. It’s funny, because I was singing a very strong song, Do not come back, and was always very emotional after doing it. And behind it came a very soft one that was Love. And my voice always trembled a little from the previous effort. I thought it was like that, but no.

The fact is that I was shaking along with the city, it was an earthquake!

-If you hadn’t been Raffaello, which singer would you have liked to be?

-Hmmm… let us think about it and I will answer you when I get back to Buenos Aires. Hahaha.