La Copla Española: Estrellita Castro

Estrella Castro Navarrete was a singer and actress known by her stage name of Estrellita Castro. She was born in Seville on 28th June 1908 in Calle Mateos Gago, the street that leads from the Giralda to the Barrio de Santa Cruz, one of the areas of the city with strongest traditional character.
Estrellita was the youngest of eleven children. Her father was a fishmonger from Galicia. From the age of eleven she attended the Maestro Realito’s dance academy, doing the housework to help pay for her classes. At the age of twelve she danced for the first time in the presence of King Alfonso XIII and Queen Victoria Eugenia. A key figure at the beginning of her career was the legendary bullfighter Ignacio Sánchez Mejías, who saw her dance at a Gala for underprivileged children and gave her a gold coin. She made her début at “Tronío” in the Calle Sierpes and went on to perform at all the major theatres in Spain, Europe, Latin America and even the United States.
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