La Malena
Who is La Malena?
Magdalena Seda Loreto, La Malena, was born in 1877 in Jerez de la Frontera, into a Roma family with a deep flamenco tradition. She was the niece of La Chorrúa, from whom she learned her first steps and the arm work that would later define her style, following an artistic path parallel to that of La Macarrona: the move from the cafés cantantes to the theater. Her brother Gaspar was the father of the dancer Manolita la Bonita, who was in turn the mother of guitarist Eduardo, La Malena’s great-nephew, who lived with her until he married.
Career
As early as 1903 she was performing at the Café Filarmónico in Seville, and in 1911 she made her first major trip to Russia with maestro Realito’s company. In the 1940s she worked for Concha Piquer, and later led her own flamenco troupe, “Malena y sus gitanas,” at the Casino de la Exposición in Seville, going on to perform at the Festivales de España in the early 1950s, where Antonio Ruiz Soler embraced her in recognition of her career.
Style
She was described as a “very distinguished” bailaora, of grandeur, art and wisdom, with great grace and compás and arms of unsurpassed elegance; her dancing, profound, unfolded fully even in the most limited space of a tablao.
Legacy
Already in her eighties, she gave her last public performance, with José Acosta singing for her accompanied by four guitarists. Her final years were spent in poverty, selling sunflower seeds and trinkets at a stall on Seville’s Alameda de Hércules, the city where she died in 1956, sunk into obscurity despite having been one of the great figures of baile jondo of her generation.