A mural in ‘his’ Barranco Grande immortalizes Manolo Mena, the voice of Tenerife

It is noted that there is a very good relationship between Ruth González and Matías. They hug each other with affection and remember that just a year ago the idea arose. The capital city council provided this wall of municipal property next to the one that was the headquarters of the mythical Himalayan Cookies and the muralist got “to work”.

The artist recalls: «The work lasted about eight days and was complicated at times, due to rain and other adverse factors, but there it is. Indeed, there it is, with a small square attached, this monster. Almost a cube twelve meters high by fourteen wide. The large-scale reproduction of a double Mena in his facets of timplista and singer appears painted. On the left, he plays Mario Texeiras’ camellito sonorous –a great luthier of this instrument– and, on the right, he appears with a microphone in the middle of a recital. Mata is based on the images of photographer Fernando Cova del Pino. Some red lines, a “wink” to the Sabandeño sash, complete the decoration of a wall with some unevenness and even the marked line of the expansion joint of the opposite building. Matías does not see it as a problem, but he understands that “it gives more richness to the whole in my opinion.”

Ruth, who is celebrating her birthday today, and Matías show their “pride” in front of an installation that will be officially inaugurated tomorrow in a ceremony presided over by the city’s mayor, José Manuel Bermúdez. Javier Hernández, soloist from Los Sabandeños, Jesús Monzón, the group led by Jeremías Martín and Ruth González herself will perform. She has sung since she was a child with some stages without doing it publicly. «Canary songs, no, because there I am in mourning. I have never done it and at the moment I will not », she affirms emphatically.

Enriching double vision

The double vision of Ruth and Matías about Manolo Mena is enriching regarding the portrait of his personality. On the one hand, the intimate one, that of the family, which represents her daughter from knowledge and memory. Together with her, her mother, Ana del Pino – on a trip to Galicia this week – and her brother, José Manuel, not very fond of appearing publicly, although he could not be in the photo shoot for work reasons. They talk about the “serious, but very funny” man who received his nickname from La Estrella – he was also known as El Hajuelo due to the formation he founded with friends united by music – after an anecdote showing his character. He once imitated the loop of copla singer Estrellita Castro in her hair during one of her many touring trips to the peninsula or Latin America with Los Sabandeños. From a little star he became a star.

Mena always lived in Barranco Grande and there was born and grew a musical vocation that her daughter nurtured as a child. For example, she remembers that at Christmas she would go out with her friends to party in the area and liven up the parties of her neighbors with songs and Christmas carols. She even met the one who would be his wife at a festival in the legendary Sala Nivaria de Taco. Music was always present.

Matías, who has made murals throughout the Canary Islands and in the rest of the country, has another perspective, since he did not know the person but the character. When he was commissioned the mural, he documented himself about Mena through social networks and was surprised that all the comments were favorable and admiring. His mother is still alive, fortunately, but the conejero recognizes –and Ruth too, like so many canaries– the enormous emotion that the song of the malagueñas arouses to the dead mother that Mena interpreted like nobody else. Without leaving the maternal figure The hands of my mother or already in another area Folías de la libertad.

For Assembly Sabotage this mural is a sample of something that he considers fundamental: decentralize culture and bring it to the neighborhoods. Although the two most important works of his in Santa Cruz are in the center; the one that remembers the late trumpeter Nilo Caparrosa, on Castillo street, and the Arcos de La Noria. Lanzaroteño by birth, he has lived in Gran Canaria and resides in Tenerife. He throws the rest into this homage to Manolo Mena from which two things have surprised him. On the one hand, the unanimous affection in social networks. On the other hand, the support and respect of the people of the Southwest neighborhood that he received while he was doing the work. «Everyone stopped, asked questions and spoke well of him. A figure typical of Barranco Grande».

a very special voice

Both coincide in the complication of approaching the timbre, register and color of voice that Mena had. Ruth rejects the verb imitate but she recognizes that there are those who try to emulate it without success.

Because Mena set her own style. “He was a magnificent tenor, who had a melodic and clear voice,” explained his partner in Los Sabandeños, Dr. Carlos García in the portrait he made when he died in the digital magazine Bienmesabe. He affirmed that “the style that he managed to implant gave rise to true beauties in malagueñas, folías and isas, without forgetting the boleros and ballads that he embroidered with his clean and precise voice”. His daughter corroborates it and influences these lesser-known musical styles.

García says that «Manolo was one of the first singers who managed to arouse large groups of fans». They asked him for autographs or to sign records, they sent him letters or visited him when he traveled to other lands. In recent times he received numerous emails or requests that were made to him in terms of learning about his life and work. He an idol in the world of folk music.

Ruth recalls that her father “was very careful with his voice, almost to the point of mania or obsession.” He was a professional who knew that the vocal cords were her tool of the trade. That’s why he warmed up a lot before each performance with the classic gurgles. In this context, García remembers it again: «Walking through the dressing rooms and corridors singing that of The pride of a canary is that God gives him a girl, who is called Candelaria and who is born dark-haired».

Professional is relative because Mena never stopped working as an accountant at Teodomiro Robayna’s Water Supply Company on La Marina Street. Matías Mata intervenes there, tired of the professionalism of the people of culture being questioned

Mena’s premise was the commitment to their land when it comes to recovering, disseminating and extolling folklore. He received numerous awards as part of Los Sabandeños but his great legacy was his voice, part of a podium of great singers that could be completed by Dacio Ferrera or Héctor González.

Nothing better than ending with some verses by Carlos Pinto Grote at the foot of his bust that Mena made his own: «I don’t mind dying if the timple goes with me».