Joseph Capdevila
From Sabadell, delighted!
Almost sixty now.
I know how to grow old with my audience.
Gray already.
I wake up every day with enthusiasm.
And now grandpa!
My son is very traditional and family-loving.
And how do you feel, grandpa?
I was always a quick tearjerker, and even more so today!
Will this inspire any songs?
I am an interpreter, I am not an author: I interpret other people’s stories.
What is your daily story today?
Today I live in the countryside, in a small town, mixed with the local people, in the square, in the streets: I love that life!
I thought you lived in Madrid.
I lived in Madrid for twenty-seven years, and I felt very free and very admired as a Catalan… But I have returned home.
And here you are still, singing.
On stage I am Sergio Dalma, but on the street I am “El Josep”. I know how to disconnect.
Like an actor?
I feel like an actor, I like singer-actors, Raphael or Mari Trini style.
He performs the legendary song Bailar pegados with great truth and intensity.
To sing it, I fall in love with a story and transmit it with all the passion.
And don’t you get tired of dancing close together?
No! My audience loves that song, and every time I sing it for the first time, I truly believe it, and I give it the air of the moment.
What is your trick to make it new?
I look at people’s faces and see that people are listening to me who were not born when I started singing it! And watching their reaction is beautiful. I don’t know what that song has… but it comes: it’s skin, friction, chills… It’s much more than sex!
Who composed Bailar Pegados?
Luis Gómez Escobar and Julio Seijas.
Since when does Sergio Dalma sing?
I have been singing professionally since I was 16. My mother came to pick me up after singing about a tractor trailer.
Are your parents alive?
Yes, they are happy and I am enjoying them.
What did they teach you?
To be happy with little and with a lot. To value all things. They did well.
And what about you and your son?
I have imitated my parents in giving him affection and love, even though I separated from his mother when he was four years old…
People are very fond of you too.
And well I notice it. A guy told me: “I don’t like your music… but I like you!”
It will be your smile.
I enjoy everything I do. And I guess that shows, I’m very transparent.
And your motto, if you have one, what is it?
“Smile because you’re in the photo”: is the title of my latest album and my current tour.
You started to appear in the photo back in the eighties… and you are still in the photo.
With my audience. My audience smiles. I really like people who smile.
What is your audience like?
I have been singing for 35 years for that woman who is now a grandmother, and 25 years for her daughter… And now also for her granddaughter.
Not everyone can say it!
This commands my respect… and makes me proud, just like having already released 22 albums.
Faithful followers.
They started listening to me on cassette tapes. And on vinyl. And then on CD. And now on Spotify. And always happy!
And if you are sad one day, what do you do?
I go out to the field. That never fails me. And I walk through a forest, with my dog…
What is your dog name?
Pichu, a whippet greyhound. We walk between trees and there… everything goes away, everything is fixed! Nature heals me.
If you didn’t sing, what would you do, Josep?
Being an actor fascinates me. I usually go to the theater. I like to arrive with the room still empty…
Oh yeah? Because?
I imagine being the actor in the play watching people enter… and I feel myself getting more and more nervous!
A case of extreme empathy, yours…
I feel that strong connection with the actors on stage and I suffer for them.
What do you think those actors long for?
The same thing I want on stage: that those who have come to see me have a good time. And I do whatever it takes for them to enjoy. I just like people!
What compliment from people has moved you the most?
One day someone told me this: “You have accompanied me all my life, day by day.”
What pleasure will you never give up?
Enjoy a bottle of good wine and enjoy a trip to beautiful Italy.
Do you ever think about death?
We die every day. It happens when sleeping. And we are reborn every day in every awakening.
