Here's a bulerías to share with your Valentine:
Bulerías
Popular
Te quiero yo
Más que a la madre
que me parió
I love you
More than
my own mother*
Here's El Almendro singing it at Peña La Bulería during the Flamenco Tour to Jerez with “Tía Juana” dancing. ¡Qué arte! (You’ll hear him singing it at the beginning and the end.)
One of my favorite things about peña shows is the fin de fiesta.
Can you see why?
El Almendro was going to sing more fandangos, (after various older men had gotten up to sing fandangos) but one of the peña members called to him, “Hey there are people here who want to dance!” so bulerías it was. Another thing I love about peña shows like this one is how into it people get. You hear it in their jaleos, their commentary, the way they sing along. The excitement is infectious.
(By the way, we met new friends from the peña this particular afternoon and had a great time. You can read more about that here.)
*This is a short coletilla however I deliberated on how to translate the last lines. I debated between:
More than my own mother,
More than the mother who gave birth to me,
And
More than my own mother who gave birth to me
Which translation do you think fits best?
Part of the reason I think they chose parió is because it rhymes with yo, so the first translation (not the literal one) made the most sense. In researching this one, I learned that this type of verse is called a pareado, which you can read more about here.
EDIT: And speaking of new friends, I met a new friend on Instagram who helped me with this one;
¡Muchísimas gracias Mirian por tu ayuda!
You can find more verses on love here.
*I published the letra a day early this week because I wanted to release it on Valentine’s Day. ;)