Guillermina Jiménez Chabolla (16 August 1930 – 25 November 2020) known professionally as Flor Silvestre, was a Mexican singer and actress, specialized in the musical genres of ranchera, bolero, huapango and bolero ranchero.
She was one of the most prominent and successful performers of Mexican and Latin American music, and was a star of classic Mexican films during the Golden Age of Mexican cinema. Her more than 70-year career included stage productions, radio programs, records, films, television programs, comics and rodeo shows.
Famed for her melodious voice and unique singing style, hence the nicknames "La Sentimental" ("The Sentimental One") and "La Voz Que Acaricia" ("The Voice That Caresses"), Flor Silvestre was a notable interpreter of the ranchera, bolero, bolero ranchero, and huapango genres. She recorded more than 300 songs for three labels: Columbia, RCA Víctor, and Musart. In 1945, she was announced as the "Alma de la Canción Ranchera" ("Soul of Ranchera Song"), and in 1950, the year in which she emerged as a radio star, she was proclaimed the "Reina de la Canción Mexicana" ("Queen of Mexican Song"). In 1950, she signed a contract with Columbia Records and recorded her first hits, which include "Imposible olvidarte", "Que Dios te perdone", "Pobre corazón", "Viejo nopal", "Guadalajara", and "Adoro a mi tierra". In 1957, she began recording for Musart Records and became one of the label's exclusive artists with numerous best-selling singles, such as "Cielo rojo", "Renunciación", "Gracias", "Cariño santo", "Mi destino fue quererte", "Mi casita de paja", "Toda una vida", "Amar y vivir", "Gaviota traidora", "El mar y la esperanza", "Celosa", "Vámonos", "Cachito de mi vida", "Miel amarga", "Perdámonos", "Tres días", "No vuelvo a amar", "Las noches las hago días", "Estrellita marinera", and "La basurita", among others. Many of her hits charted on Cashbox Mexico's Best Sellers and Record World Latin American Single Hit Parade. She also participated in her husband Antonio Aguilar's musical rodeo shows.
Flor Silvestre appeared in more than seventy films between 1950 and 1990. Beautiful and statuesque, she became one of the leading stars of the "golden age" of the Mexican film industry. She made her acting debut in the film Primero soy mexicano (1950), directed by and co-starring Joaquín Pardavé. She played opposite famous comedians, such as Cantinflas in El bolero de Raquel (1957). Director Ismael Rodríguez gave her important roles in La cucaracha (1959), and Ánimas Trujano (1962), which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. She was also the star of the comic book La Llanera Vengadora. In 2013, the Association of Mexican Cinema Journalists honored her with the Special Silver Goddess Award.
Silvestre died on 25 November 2020 at her home in Villanueva, Zacatecas.
Life and career
1930–1938: Childhood Flor Silvestre was born Guillermina Jiménez Chabolla on 16 August 1930 in Salamanca, Guanajuato, Mexico. She was the third child and second daughter of Jesús Jiménez Cervantes, a butcher, and María de Jesús Chabolla Peña (1906 – 5 September 1993). Her father owned and ran a meat shop in Salamanca. Her older siblings are Francisco "Pancho" and Raquel, and her younger siblings are Enriqueta "La Linda Prieta", José Luis, María de la Luz "Mary", and Arturo. Enriqueta and María de la Luz also became singers. Her maternal grandparents were Felipe Chabolla and Inés Peña.
Guillermina was raised in Salamanca and began singing at an early age. Her parents, who were also fond of singing, encouraged her to sing. She loved the mariachi music of famous Mexican singers Jorge Negrete and Lucha Reyes, and also sang songs that belonged to the pasodoble, tango, and bolero genres, which were popular in Mexico in the late 1930s. Her interest in singing and acting led her to participate in Christmas pageants, school plays, and local festivals.Liner notes by Raúl Vieyra for the album Flor Silvestre, vol. 6.
Her mother, who wanted to live in Mexico City, urged her father to sell all their property in Salmanca and relocate the family to the Mexican capital. María de Jesús took her three youngest children with her to Mexico City, leaving the oldest four (including Guillermina) in Salamanca in the care of her sisters, who were nuns. Guillermina completed primary school in Salamanca before reuniting with her family in Mexico City. In Mexico City, her parents enrolled her in the Escuela Bancaria Comercial Milton on Madero Avenue, where she took secretarial classes.
1943–1949: Early stage and radio success
Guillermina Jiménez (Flor Silvestre) began her singing career in 1943, when she was 13 years old. She and her father attended a performance of the famous Mariachi Pulido at the Teatro del Pueblo, a theater located in the Abelardo L. Rodríguez Market in central Mexico City. After the performance was over, she got up on stage and told the stage director that she wanted to sing. The Mariachi Pulido's director refused to accompany her, stating that they did not collaborate with amateurs, but the stage director, Carlos López Santillán, told her that he would let her sing the following week and promised to hire a mariachi from the Tenampa bar to perform with her. On the day of her debut, wearing a traditional Mexican blouse and skirt her mother had made for her, she sang three popular songs, "La canción mexicana", "Yo también soy mexicana", and "El herradero". Her performance was a great success and she received an ovation from the audience.
Her next performance at the Teatro del Pueblo was in the play La soldadera, directed by López Santillán, in which she played a girl who comes out of a railway wagon and sings "La soldadera", a song written for her by José de Jesús Morales. The play was also broadcast by Mexico's national radio station, XEFO, and "La soldadera" became the first song she performed on radio. The title of the song, which is Spanish for "the female soldier", also became her first stage name until it was claimed by another singer. Arturo Blancas, an Excélsior journalist and XEFO announcer, thought she looked more "like a flower" than a soldier and suggested she change her stage name to La Amapola, which means "the poppy". However, this stage name was also claimed by another woman, the sister of singer La Panchita. Blancas then chose the title of Dolores del Río's 1943 drama film as the young singer's new stage name, and Guillermina Jiménez became Flor Silvestre, which means "wild flower".
Under her new stage name, Flor Silvestre won first place in an amateur contest sponsored by Mexico's most popular radio station, XEW, known as "the voice of Latin America from Mexico". Her participation in the contest earned her a contract to sing in revues at the Teatro Colonial, located on San Juan de Letrán Avenue (now Eje Central). The Teatro Colonial was "Mexico's most popular [theater]" in the 1940s, and Flor Silvestre's performances there were noticed by a showman who hired her as part of his touring company. The showman and his company toured Torreón, in northern Mexico, where Flor Silvestre was the opening act of the touring company's headliner, the famous Argentine tango singer Hugo del Carril. Flor Silvestre's family was experiencing financial problems at the time, and she sang at banquets and other places in order to win more money and help her parents.
In December 1945, Flor Silvestre performed at Guadalajara's Coliseo Olímpico and was announced as "Flor Silvestre, the Soul of Ranchera Song". In November 1946, she was invited to perform at the inauguration of Guadalajara's Juárez movie theater. The Guadalajara newspaper El Informador described her as "Flor Silvestre, young XEW singer, who represents the feeling of our land within the ranchera song". Between 1947 and 1949, Flor Silvestre and the showman's company toured Central and South America, performing at the best nightclubs along the way. Hugo del Carril presented Flor Silvestre to audiences when the company toured Argentina.Liner notes by Raúl Vieyra from the album Flor Silvestre, vol. 6 (1967). The company eventually made its way to Peru, where they performed for the Mexican Air Force, before returning to Mexico.
1950–1952: Acting debut and first records
When Flor Silvestre returned to Mexico from her South American tour in 1950, her manager got her a contract to perform at Mexico City's most popular nightclub, El Patio. She later said: "Emilio Azcárraga and Gregorio Walerstein went there every day, and everyone saw me there, and they all hired me without me asking for anything, and everyone called me and called me, and that's how I started [singing] on the XEW [station]". Azcárraga, the owner of XEW, Mexico's top station, gave her her first radio program, Increíble pero cierto, which she also hosted. Walerstein, a leading film producer known as "the Tsar of Mexican films", signed her to a five-film contract.
With the success of her radio program, her singing career began to ascend. Journalist Mónica Fio wrote in her column "Micrófono":
Flor Silvestre made her first records in 1950 for Columbia Records' Mexican branch. She recorded at least twelve songs for the label, one on each side of six 78 rpm singles. These songs also became her first hits. "Imposible olvidarte", "Que Dios te perdone", "Pobre corazón", "Viejo nopal", "Guadalajara", and "Mi amigo el viento" were recorded with Gilberto Parra's mariachi. "Siempre el amor", "Con un polvo y otro polvo", "Adoro a mi tierra", "La presentida", "Llorar amargo", and "Oye, morena" were recorded with Rubén Fuentes' mariachi. After recording her first singles, Flor Silvestre formed a duet named Las Flores with her then-unknown sister La Prieta Linda; they recorded two songs—"Los desvelados" and "Lo traigo en la sangre" (with Rubén Fuentes' mariachi)—for Columbia.
In February 1950, she was a part of the "numerous, hybrid, but useful cast" of ¡A los toros!, a revue about bullfighting staged at the Teatro Tívoli. It was written and presented by announcer Paco Malgesto, who would become her second husband. In the revue, she sang Mexican musical numbers associated with bullfights.
Although Flor Silvestre had made her film debut in 1949 singing in Te besaré en la boca (released in 1950), she was given her first leading role in the Walerstein production Primero soy mexicano (1950), co-starring Joaquín Pardavé (who also wrote and directed the film) and Luis Aguilar and featuring Francisco "Charro" Avitia.
She was reunited with her Primero soy mexicano co-stars Luis Aguilar and Francisco Avitia in the film El tigre enmascarado, which premiered in 1951. She then appeared as the leading lady of actor Dagoberto Rodríguez in a film trilogy, El lobo solitario, La justicia del lobo, and Vuelve el lobo (all released in 1952).
1955–1957: Return to films and television debut In early 1955, Flor Silvestre sang on the XEW radio program Su programa Calmex, sponsored by Calmex Sardines. Other entertainers on the program included Miguel Aceves Mejía, the Trío Tariácuri, and the Hermanitas de Alba.
In 1955, she also appeared in her first color film, La doncella de piedra, one of the first Mexican CinemaScope productions. An adaptation of Rómulo Gallegos' novel Sobre la misma tierra, the film features Flor Silvestre in the role of Cantaralia Barroso, the mother of the novel's protagonist, Remota Montiel (played by Elsa Aguirre).