An unsuccessful attempt to destroy Gallito’s legacy

Roy Gittings

(photo from todocoleccion.net)

Circulo Rojo is a print-on-demand publisher, but I finally managed to get a copy of Callejo’s vitriolic Contrarrevisión (see the June blog ‘Joselito v Belmonte in the 21st century’ ). Callejo has a bad word to say about almost everyone and I think this probably stems from a grudge held against Domingo Delgado, who Callejo says he knows personally. Having said that, anyone who has read anything of Delgado will know that he is outspoken and that most of his “theories” should be taken with a pinch of salt. I think Callejo’s book sets out not so much to laud the toreo of Belmonte but to destroy the legacy of the younger Gallo.

Late on in his book, Callejo tells us that the be-all and end-all of toreo is the trinity of parar, mandar and templar and this was Belmonte’s invention. Surely, these three actions were to be seen in some form or other in the earliest form of toreo de a pie. If not, I would doubt that spectators would pay to see what would have been chaos. Toreo de a pie must have had, from the earliest times, some sort of order to attract spectators. But it is not just using the trinity that is important, but what a torero does with it. Belmonte used single pases and expelled the bull from his body while José brought the bull around his body, trying to fuse bull and torero. From Manolete onwards, everyone did this and with the bull very close to the body.

Callejo makes very little mention of the part the breeding selection of the bulls played in the evolution of toreo. He chides Guerrita, who had a penchant for Vistahermosa bulls, for meddling in the natural selection of the species when, in the 1890s, he asked the ganaderos to select a more refined bull which benefitted both Juan and José. The breeders continued with the selection of bulls for toreo en redondo from then on. José also asked the breeders to refine the bulls during his time and during the 20s and 30s this continued. However, after the Spanish Civil War, what came out of the toriles were novillos because (1) the Republican troops were annihilating (without enlisting Joselito) whole herds in their zone and (2) I am sure that the older animals in the nationalist zone were killed off for food for the troops and civilians. Manolete took full advantage of this condition.

We are also told that, while Belmonte performed with all sorts of bloodlines, José was exterminating all except Vistahermosa. Well, it turns out that the most popular bloodline with toreros has always been Vistahermosa, and in particular the line developed by Juan Domínguez Ortiz El Barbero de Utrera / Arias Saavedra down to Eduardo Ibarra / Fernando Parladé. This is why at least ninety percent of what we see these days is from the encaste of Juan Pedro Domecq. Remember the spat prior to the royal corridas in 1789 with Costillares and Illo refusing to kill Castilian bulls and the empresa of Madrid bringing Andalucían bulls for the following season when both of these toreros were contracted?

José and Juan performed together 258 times with 43 of these corridas being mano a mano. During his career, Juan performed 102 times with Murube and 96 with Gamero Cívico (both of the Vistahermosa line). Close behind, in the eighties, come Concha y Sierra, Santa Coloma (Vistahermosa) and Miura, with Pablo Romero at 69. José, on the other hand, performed with Santa Coloma 105 times, Guadalest (Hidalgo Barquero strain which was a cross of Visterhermosa and Vázquez) 93 times, Miura 91 times, Vicente Martínez (Jijón with an Ibarra semental) and Murube 80 times. Not quite what Callejo would lead us to believe.

Yes, Juan played a fundamental part in what we see today but so did José because he perfected toreo in redondo by linking passes and making continuity possible. All the important toreros after 1920 (except Domingo López Ortega) fused both styles, with Manuel Jiménez Chicuelo being the first to do so with perfection in Madrid in 1928.

I am in agreement with Callejo in that the torero who imposed his style on practically every bull in Spain and the Americas was Manuel Rodríguez Manolete. However, what Callejo fails to tell us is that Manolete followed the line of toreo en redondo. He got closer to the bull than Juan, brought it in a straight line past his body and then, with a flick of his wrist, turned the bull 180º and continued to do that for as long as the bull would take the punishment. The spectators thought it electrifying, although some writers and journalists complained that it was not the classical way of doing things.

Callejo’s only words on Juan’s style are quite confusing in that he mentions a passage of Pepe Alameda who describes Juan’s toreo, but Callejo omits to say that this passage was written from a meeting with Alameda and Juan at a tienta at the ranch of Lamamie de Clairac in 1935 when Juan had, for many years, incorporated toreo en redondo into his style.

Regarding Sánchez de Neira’s comments on the toreo en redondo of Cayetano Sanz, the journalist of El Enano, for the season of 1856, is quite enthusiastic in that Cayetano’s naturales were quite magnificent, but at that time the phrase ‘toreo en redondo’ was not in existence. However, in the same volume of El Toreo, Sánchez describes the action thus:

“A pase natural en redondo is executed with one hand and is continuous. However, it should be said that a pase en redondo cannot be achieved in a single pass because with a single pass one can only achieve, at most, a semicircle. So, a true pase en redondo can only be achieved with two or more passes.”

In this sense, redondo does not mean ‘round’, but coming back to where one started.

While José did not achieve this (and, strictly, neither did Manolete because of his toreo paralelo) it was José’s innovation to link passes that made it possible. Perhaps the first true pase en redondo was carried out by Luis Miguel Dominguín in the 1940s.