Rocio Jurado| The scorned women in Latin music
Rocio Jurado was a Spanish singer and actress. "Ese hombre" is a blend of two musical genres: a Copla (a Spanish regional music genre) and soft rock characteristic of the late 70's and 80's.
Rocio Jurado singing Ese hombre (1979)
I had originally planned to release one long article on 5 scorned women in Latin music. However, their stories are so rich, I decided to do a series instead. Opting to give each woman the time and care she deserves. The first in this series is Shakira. Head over to the introductory article to find out about the other women on the list.
¿What is aCopla?
Copla began in 1902 with Suspiros de España and has been a traditional music genre that has influenced Spanish music ever since. Its influence can be seen in works as recent as Rosalía's El mal querer (2018) and Motomami (2022).
The copla's history is contentious. It emerged as a genre that linked (or coupled) other regional genres. It became popular in the first decades of the XX century. Its themes and structure follow the poetic form of the same name.
Copla: A poem and a song
To understand the copla in poetry, we need to know a little bit about the Spanish language poetics.
For a poem to be considered a copla, it has to follow three different characteristics that separate it from other poetic forms:
First, its stanzas must consist of four verses, each of eight or fewer poetic syllables (lesser art meter*.)
Second, the meter's form must be one of the following: romance, segundilla, or rondilla. The meter types vary depending on the verse and rhyme type.
The theme and style of the poem must be popular by nature. Its language is easily understood by anyone, not just by academic elites. Its subject matter expresses passionate emotions and comedic sketches. It explores relationships that deviate from what is morally acceptable in a society.
The musical genre copla sprouted from the seeds the poetical form had already planted in the Spanish imaginary. But its roots spread more like a mycelium network interconnecting influences from many aspects of Spanish culture. Musical theater, cuplé, tonadilla, Opera flamenca, pasodoble, etc.
The dictatorship
Francisco Franco, fascist dictrator.
Unfortunately, its wide reach made it an easy target for appropriation by the Spanish fascist regime. The Franco dictatorship (1936-1975) saw it as a mass consumption product that should be used to influence the masses' views on culture. Only the copla singers, like Concha Piquer or Estrellita Castro, who endorsed conservative views, were allowed to perform.
The dictatorship was established at the end of the Spanish Civil war. The Francoist project professed the racist view that Spanish people were superior to others based on their moral purity. Purity, which was rooted in catholicism and imperialism. The project seeks to impose a hegemonic view of Spain's past and present. It worshiped militarism, professed conservatism, and the enforcement of strict traditional gender roles. Men were expected to be hypermasculine, and women were expected to be subservient to their families and husbands and devoted to maternity.
This was a complete bastardization of the copla. A musical genre that had its inception in the communal experience of nonintellectuals and celebration of human passions was weaponized as the propaganda arm of a fascistic dictatorship.
Terror and oppression
Opposers to the dictatorship included the left-leaning Republican faction, the Popular Front, queer people, and independent women. They were characterized as "unwanted" by the Nationalist faction. Imprisonment and executions were ordered for anyone guilty of supporting Spanish Republican values, including women's autonomy, women's right to vote, proponents of social democracy, communists, anarchists, and those who supported regional independence.
Miguel de Molina, copla writer who was tortured for being gay
Many fled in self-imposed exile to Mexico or Argentina. It is estimated that around 200'000 Spaniards died during the Spanish Civil War. Many fought and died. Others, around 10'000 left-leaning dissidents of the fascist dictatorship, were sent to Nazi concentration camp Mauthausen; 4'427 were reported to have died there.
Despite the franquismo attempt to use it as conservative propaganda, the copla of the people persisted in opposition to the racist culture and against the morality censorship of the regime. People found respite to oppression through the copla.
The peoples copla celebrated the full spectrum of the human experience. It provided a place for dissent. This is a genre where cheaters proudly confess their misdeeds; it's for overly excited lovers to share their passionate love affairs. The copla is where messy emotions we are told to suppress can flourish.
Two of the most influential copla writers in copla music were out of the closet: Rafael de León and Manuel Quiroga. Unfortunately, the bravery of the queer men and straight women who dared oppose the regime was punished heavily.
Federico Garcia Lorca, Spanish poet and playwright.
Garcia Lorca, the poet, was killed in 1936 by a firing squad at the beginning of the Civil War. The Franco police accused him of being "a homosexual, communist mason," and for that, he was murdered. Lorca was gay. And he was a supporter of Frente Popular. His contribution of intense and complex female characters in plays and poems is invaluable to Spanish literature. He died at 38.
Miguel de Molina, the copla singer, was captured and tortured for being gay and having been a soldier for the Spanish Republican Army. He fled to Argentina, where he lived in exile until his death.
Art as resistance
The copla genre was popular before the Franco dictatorship. During the dictatorship (and despite the attempts at appropriating it), the copla was famous as a resistance genre. It provided community and an artistic outlet to the people labeled as "unwanted": gay men, strong, independent women, left-leaning activists, and anyone who did not fit the narrow expectations of morality and gender norms.
The copla continued to be popular despite the tragic killings of gay men. Copla's queer identity continued to prosper because brave men and women got on the stage and challenged the morality censorship. Paco España was a pioneer in Spanish drag culture. He started doing drag to copla music by the 1970s, a few years before the end of the dictatorship in 1975.
It's a genre of drama, but most importantly, of resistance. All of the women we have explored in the series "The Scorned Women on Latin Music" have been heavily influenced by the brave copla singers and writers who risked their lives and safety to express themselves.
The copla is perhaps the inception of the often overused and many times harmful stereotype of a feisty Latina woman. But in reality, women had to be fierce to protect themselves from the men who tried to harm them and subjugate them.
Rocio Jurado is credited for modernizing the copla. She used the same themes and genres the copla had used but fussed with newer genres like soft rock or ballads. Jurado wore evening gowns and expressed her sexuality more freely.
Even if she modernized copla, she acknowledged the oppression faced by the gay men who pioneered the genre. In an interview in 1983, she thank the queer performers who came before her for creating a world where artists could feel protected by art after having suffered persecution. She said, "We (female performers) have a moral duty to them, as human beings, to give them much love and care. And I will always give it to them.”
A modern copla
Ese hombre follows the characteristics of copla poetry. It is mostly written in Redondilla, a subtype of copla poetry. A redondilla has one stanza formed by four octosyllable lines. The verses have an ABBA consonance rhythm.
Rocio's performance of Ese Hombre showcases her acting training. As a copla performer, she is trained in opera-like delivery of emotions. They are over-the-top, and there is no room for natural performance or natural lighting on the stage. This is a theater, and it's grand. This is Drama.
She starts her live performance with her back facing a zooming-out camera, guitar strings strumming on the audio track. The guitars are reminiscent of classical acoustic Spanish guitars, but they are electric and have the feel of soft rock.
Rocio steps back and turns her body first, her head and hair following after. Dramatically, she stares in shock. Rocio wears a white pantsuit and a lace chal. Quickly, she puts one foot back, both hands at her hips, almost as if preparing a fighting stance.
She changes her mic from the left to the right hand as she steps forward with two short but deliberate steps. She quickly sways her body over the balls of her feet, like a boxer bounce-stepping while assessing his opponent's next move. She flicks her hair out of her face and lifts her chin, taunting her opponent as if telling him, "Come, I dare you to try me."
She daringly stares at the audience. She breathes in deeply and dramatically, and she starts singing on her exhale.
"That man you see over there,
the one that seems so gallant,
so attentive and arrogant.
I know him as I know myself."
Rocio glares at the audience. She turns 15 degrees towards the camera and continues,
"That man you see over there,
the one who appears divine,
so affable and effusive.
The only thing he knows what to do is cause suffering."
Deep breath in. She deathly stares down the camera. She proceeds, enunciating each word with palpable disdain.
"He is a massive fool,
a conceited stupid one.
He is selfish and capricious.
He is a vain clown,
an unwitting show-off,
a small, resentful, fake one
who has no heart.
He is full of jealousy, he has no reasons
nor motives to (be). He is impetuous like the
wind. He is very rarely
affectionate. He is insecure with himself.
He is barely bearable as a friend
and he is insufferable as a lover.”
She quickly changes hands on her mic. The hand holding the mic is brought backwards, both arms extended to either direction of her body. One could think she is about to throw the mic over at a man in front of her. Or whatever object she could find
She she strikes a power pose before singing again.
"That man you see over there,
the one that seems so gentle,
giving, and agreeable.
I know him as I know myself.
That man you see over there,
the one who seems so sure
of being able to eat the world.
The only thing he knows what to do is cause suffering.”
Jurado points her finger at the camera. Singing at him.
“He is a massive fool,
a conceited stupid one.
He is selfish and capricious.
He is a vain clown,
an unwitting show-off,
a small, resentful, fake one
who has no heart.
He is full of jealousy, he has no reasons
nor motives to (be). He is impetuous like the
wind. He is very rarely affectionate.”
The volume of the mic slowly fades out and she ends her performance hiding her face from the audience.
The performance she is giving is one meant to humiliate a man. But the performer is just as conscious of the audience as she is of the "unwitting show-off of a man" she sings about. She taunts the audience with her theatrical gestures as much as she taunts the man with her words. As if she is also daring the audience to say something. She is telling us to be careful, not only of that petulant man, but, most importantly, we must be cautious of her. A mad, scorned woman whose fury surpases hell itself.
The song lyrics expose the duplicitous nature of said man. He appears to be a good, upstanding, kind, virtuous man to the world. But to the woman who knows him as much as she knows herself, he is a petulant fool, a heartless show-off. She sees him for who he truly is, a clown. Her performance distills his dichotomous nature. She is unveiling the true man, the man of the private sphere. She is lifting the veil so the world can see his true persona. She crumbles his upstanding public persona.
It is impossible not to think of the fragile men who needed to install a fascistic regime that lasted almost 40 years to protect their fragile masculinity from strong independent women and gay men. That type of man is a massive stupid fool. That type of dictator is selfish and capricious. He is a vain clown who needs to justify his "superiority" because he is unsure of himself.
In the end, the man in the song was a massive fool who dared harm a woman, thinking she was weak and deserved to take his ire. Foolish men ignore that women like Rocio Jurado have formed shields as strong as metal out of the anger and oppression she has faced.
In her performance, her anger was contrived, not quite explosive, but she showed immense dominance of the stage and the viewers. She is willing to show this vulnerable side to her. She is setting up her menacing and vengeful demeanor. She showed him off. She exposed the true character of a private, cold, and narcissistic man who, to the public, pretended to be a kindhearted person.
*1 English is a stress-time language, meaning the meter measures the feet of a verse. On the other hand, Spanish is a syllable-timed language: the meter measures the number of poetic syllables in a verse.
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