There is a colossal tenacity in Rapahel that makes him sing as if it were precisely what united him to life. This is not the naturalness of an Aznavour in his old age or of BB King, an old bluesmen who was born to die with the guitar without asking any questions other than that of the next song, but rather something charged with pride and a defiant attitude towards the passing of time, with which he relates by fighting it untamed. As if living could only be a form of irritability, as if singing took the form of a challenge in each verse, in each sentence, in each gesture. Especially since an illness recently warned Raphaël that even he could not avoid the end. It’s this almost bullfighting bravery that keeps him in shape and allows him to continue a concert tour which, if not marathons, has a generous duration for an 82-year-old man who still performs on stages around the world. His stay in Barcelona for his last recital of the year was the result of this unwavering determination.
Before the concert began, at an unusually early hour, an image of Raphael, still young, reminded him of where he came from, decades ago. The elevators in the hall that avoided the stairs showed lines of people for whom attending their idol’s concert was also a bit of a challenge. That is why, as soon as he arrived on stage, he was greeted with a standing ovation in which there was also a kind of tribute to himself, an affirmation of life from the 6,200 people who officially attended the recital. Black jacket full of sequins which didn’t last long before giving in to the piano, slow rhythm and confident voice. Already in the second song a useless clarification: “I am still the one/despite the doubts/and my eternal madness. » The idea of singularity was reinforced Whatever they say who illuminated the room for the first time, a cauldron of memories gradually warmed by a long life. and in my big nightby Adamo, one of the many performed during the concert, there were already ladies getting up from their seats to dance like one more of these great nights experienced. But despite such outbursts, calm marked a break in the evening in the stands, which followed the concert with a kind of admiring restraint that Rapahel himself did not break with the speeches, as if all his energy should be focused only on singing.
And he did it well, solvent and without fanfare, with the wisdom not to strip his voice in pursuit of impossible notes, without playing with the microphone and distances, concise in his effort, knowing that aging is nothing other than managing finite energies. A section of ballads left his voice accompanied only by piano and strings, and in I likesitting in a chair he used from time to time, his fingers moved in a supportive gesture. In If you weren’t there There was no drums either and the accordion accompanied his immersion in the songreflection of his last album, to address Piaf. There was a big group, but they sang several songs or only with the piano, the tango Malenaor only with guitar, case of Thanks to life which aroused so much complicit applause. Because basically the whole audience was celebrating having reached that point in the calendar where looking back offers a vast expanse of fallen leaves. It is the same spirit of the Raphaelísimo tour, a journey through six decades of career which, in Sant Jordi, have been a common celebration.
Sure, there were imperfections, moments of unresponsive vocals, lapses, cut adaptations, and seeking help from the audience to complete choruses that allowed for breaks along the way, but Rapahel’s pride and craftsmanship withstood it all. The public thanked him for his involvement and, in I was in lovewith a wink to Day trip of the Beatles, they danced, in the same way as in to be in love arms swayed remembering those distant years when love was an unstoppable chemical explosion which, with his passionate interpretation, Raphaël recreated in the much applauded My love. Love, the subtext of Raphael’s songbook over the years dating back to when the Three Wise Men had no competition from an obese man dressed in red and The little drummer We saw it on black and white televisions. When it rang, with the snow falling on the room’s screens, nostalgia was unleashed and cell phones appeared for the first time with another memory, this one in color, of this Christmas that has changed so much. It is for this reason that seeing someone who has changed solely because of nature has never ceased to be a cause for collective celebration.
With Raphael waving off stage in the instrumental finale of What do people know about me?the idea slipped that the encores would be incorporated into the body of the concert, without interruption. And if there wasn’t enough drummer, I am that Images of Raphael which, more than the passage of time, reminded us that he is still there, alive and singing, making song the reason for living. After an hour and forty hours of light pop, ballads, Latin American songs and song, Scandal Raphaël drew some dance gestures and the memory of another force of nature, Rocío Jurado, closed the evening with as I love you. She is gone, he, like his audience, is still there.
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