Niño de Gloria
Who is Niño de Gloria?
Rafael Ramos Antúnez, known artistically as Niño de Gloria (also referred to as Niño Gloria), was born in 1893 in Jerez de la Frontera, Cádiz, and died in Seville in 1954. He belonged to a family with a clear flamenco calling, as two other figures of the cante of the era, La Pompi and La Sorda, were his siblings.
His stage name has a curious origin: it comes from a villancico por bulerías he used to perform in his early years, in which he repeated the word “gloria” insistently, a detail that ended up giving him his name.
Career
His beginnings took place in Jerez, where he combined flamenco gatherings of cabales with work on the farmsteads of the Cádiz countryside. That informal apprenticeship, tied to the rural and festive atmosphere of Jerez, was the foundation of his training as a cantaor before he made the leap to a professional career.
He later moved to Seville, where he found a place in the cafés cantantes, performing alongside other leading figures of the moment. His profile grew with performances in Madrid, at the Kursaal Imperial in 1924 and the Monumental Cinema in 1927, and between 1933 and 1934 he took part in the production “Las calles de Cádiz” alongside La Argentinita. During the 1930s and 1940s he was a regular presence on Seville’s Alameda de Hércules, accompanied on guitar by artists such as Manolo de Badajoz and Niño Ricardo.
Palos and discography
He was especially skilled in fandangos, bulerías jerezanas, villancicos, siguiriyas, and soleá, with a personal style that left a school of followers in several of these palos. His recordings, made together with guitarists Manolo de Badajoz and Niño Ricardo, capture a good part of that repertoire and today stand as a testimony to the cante of Jerez and Seville in the first half of the twentieth century.
Legacy
Niño de Gloria ended up becoming the official cantaor of the balconies during Seville’s Holy Week, earning fame as one of the great saeteros of his time. That facet, combined with his versions of fandangos, bulerías, and villancicos, set a style followed by the cantaores who came after him, which explains why his name remains associated today with the cante por saetas of the city.