“A moment in history / where the colors of my skin are born / an encounter with your shadow / that my blood is baptized in your color”. Until recently, a good part of the thousands of fans who come every two weeks to the Estadio de los Juegos Mediterráneos did not know their team’s anthem. Created in 2011 by Guillermo Fernández, the theme is much more modern and catchy than the old one. However, it wasn’t until February 12 when the red-and-white fans began to sing one of the most representative symbols a cappella. It was at La Rosaleda, when, spontaneously and scarves to heaven, the 2,000 fans from Almeria celebrated their team’s victory while singing that “red and white sentiment, heart of my loyalty”. Eight days later, for the first time in the history of the Indálica entity, the 8,000 spectators began what seems to be a tradition: ‘bufandeo’ and a cappella anthem before each match.
The British writer EL James asserted that she did not believe in luck or chance. That Pilar Bogado Cruzado (1999, Moguer, Huelva) performed a flamenco version of the anthem during the week of Málaga-Almería was not by chance, but rather one of the reasons for the resurgence of the Almería fans through the anthem. While Álex Pozo, her partner, slept, the singer from Huelva prepared a surprise for her: she took out the piano notes after three hours of hard work to play and sing those beautiful verses by Guillermo Fernández, with a slightly more sedate, passionate and flamenco version. “When I got up and saw him, I had a lot of messages about how well he sang and about the anthem. Everything he does makes it beautiful,” says the right-hander. What was supposed to be a simple family surprise became a viral video that spread like wildfire on the internet. “It was for Alejandro. The music freaks him out and that night, super late, I wanted to surprise him. It’s a pride that people sing it as a result of seeing my version”Pilar highlights.
Contestant on ‘La Voz’ in 2020 and finalist in the first edition of ‘La Voz Kids’, in 2014, Pilar explains that the flamenco version she did invites you to sing it. “I’ve slowed it down, now it’s a bit slower and you can sing it perfectly. The anthem is beautiful. I have helped the way of singing it a little more by being so fast. Now they are more animated because people see that they can follow the rhythm of the music. It makes me very happy every time I’m in the stadium and they sing it “, she says before accepting the challenge posed by this means: sing it on the lawn of the Mediterranean if Almería finally ends up ascending. “I wish! That would be very nice for me, the greatest. I would be delighted. We are both very well in Almería, they treat us super well, we receive a lot of love on the street. It shows in the day to day”, explains the Huelva.
The Sevilla defender on loan to Rubi’s team (in the event of promotion, he would automatically become the property of the UDA) is looking forward to achieving his sporting goal and seeing his girlfriend fulfill that dream on the pitch where copper is beaten every two weeks . “She knows very well that it moves me a lot. I love the music he makes. He is very young and has incredible potential,” says the Sevillian, proud that his fans have started singing the anthem a cappella. “It’s something incredible. Every time we feel more support and that helps in the race towards promotion to give everything. More and more fans come to see us and more and more are heard. We need to have them close and we feel it, especially in this final stretch of the league. Now more than ever we need the support of the fans,” he continues.
Competition for the number of followers on social networks, but also for who has the best voice. “Alejandro doesn’t sing badly. He likes music. He listens to more flamenco than I do!”Pilar comments before hesitating between laughs to her boyfriend, six years after starting the relationship. “We don’t have a pique… but I have more followers than him! I always tell him that they follow him because they know me [risas]. Then they see me on the street and tell me where Pozo is. We are two very humble people, we stand with everyone”, he jokes, trusting that Almería will end up being promoted to the First Division in a month and a half. “I live from day to day and I see Alejandro suffer. It is a job that is long term. You can’t be thinking all day about the ascent. But you have to motivate yourself because he is just around the corner. Although it may seem like a cliché, the players are very motivated when the fans support and sing at the Stadium. The most important thing is to feel supported, to notice the affection of the fans even if you lose. Not feeling alone, but with a supportive crowd behind”, he highlights.
Álex Pozo and Pilar Bogado pose with the Almería scarf.
Carlos Beard (Daily AS)
The ball and the microphone to express feelings
“Nobody wants to win that madness that makes man a child for a while, playing as the child plays with the balloon and as the cat plays with the ball of wool: dancer who dances with a light ball like the balloon that goes into the air and the ball that rolls, playing without knowing that he is playing, without reason and without a clock and without a judge”. Eduardo Galeano embodied in ‘Football in the Sun and Shadows’ that happiness typical of a footballer, transforming when he jumps onto the pitch into an individual practically different from the one he was before putting on his boots. For Pilar, in this expression of the different feelings, the king sport and music coincide. “They are similar in motivation. You go out to play and you have to be motivated. The same thing happens with music. You listen to a song and you are motivated even if you are not a singer,” he answers
“Singing expresses many feelings from day to day, everything is thrown out. I have a different personality than Alejandro. I sing and cast out all my worries. If I’m sad, I even sing better. And if the letter comes to my hair with the problem, I throw everything. But something similar happens to him because sometimes rage makes me play even better. He knows how to differentiate his day-to-day problems from his work. I always tell him that he has the virtue of separating his concerns from football“, continues the singer, before being honest and pulling on wisdom and philosophy. “I’ve been a while that I don’t find myself much. I had a regular time with the pandemic, Alejandro and I were alone in Mallorca. I left ‘La Voz’ with a great desire to do things and they just confined us. Everything was stopped. Music is one of the most affected sectors. But a few years ago I would have been overwhelmed and now I’m waiting for my opportunity because my time will come. There are many people who get frustrated. I don’t have that mindset anymore. You have to adjust to what is there. I don’t want to force anything because I get overwhelmed, I get frustrated and I end up getting bored. Things come as they come and that’s it. Going to the psychologist when I was little helped me a lot. With the pandemic I have continued to work psychologically. It helps me a lot for day to day, “says Pilar, aware that both she and her partner are two privileged.
The ‘girl with the arrows’ becomes a woman.
Although it sounds contradictory, it was shyness that caused Pilar’s pulse not to tremble when picking up the microphone and that thousands and thousands of people listen to her beautiful voice. “What I really liked was dancing. But I had a problem: I was very shy and I didn’t relate to people. My mother took me to a psychologist and he recommended that I sign up for an activity that I liked. Well, the dance and the song! In the end I left the dance. Look: I went from being ashamed to interact with people on a day-to-day basis to singing in public with many spectators,” says the former ‘girl with the saetas’, now a woman.
At the age of seven, he began appearing on ‘Menuda Noche’, on Canal Sur, as a rebound. “A teacher of mine had a choir. It was Christmas and they were preparing a Christmas carol. The day before the performance a girl from the choir got sick and the teacher called me. I didn’t belong to the choir, but since she taught me… Coincidences of life. I already stayed in the program”, says that girl, ‘the one with the snails’, who won the affection of Juan y Medio and all of Andalusia. All this after a hard effort. At the Amparo Correa Foundation, after the death of The cantaora and guitarist began going to the Huelva town of Calañas to the house of the flamencologist Gonzalo Clavero to continue learning, traveling twice a week more than 100 kilometers round trip.
At just eight years old, he participated in an album of young promises of the Huelva fandango in a childhood in which he also won the first prize in the Alosno fandango contest. She moved like a fish in water in different events, such as the National Flamenco Contest of Carmona, in 2011 she played Isabel Pantoja in the miniseries ‘Today I want to confess’, on Antena 3. His fame skyrocketed eight years ago, when, in Malú’s team, he was a finalist in the firstmere edition of ‘The Voice Kids’ (2014), together with María Parrado and Carlos Weinberg. With several projects in hand, she has recently recorded two flamenco pop collaborations, with Borja Rubio and León Bravo. “I have my personality marked. I am very flamenco. I have studied the deepest. People no longer listen to as much pure flamenco as before, but, although my style is changing due to day-to-day circumstances, I am ‘flamenco, flamenco'” , ends a chameleon from Huelva who would love to celebrate the promotion of Almería on the lawn of the Mediterranean Games Stadium by singing the rojiblanco anthem that the stands are already singing a cappella.