Miguel Ríos responds to a spectator who asked him not to do politics in his concerts: “How am I going to keep quiet? I am a political being”

With the Palestinian scarf on his shoulders, Miguel Ríos responded to the shouts of an attendee who criticized him during his concert in Marbella for doing “politicking”: “How am I going to keep quiet? How am I not going to talk about politics?”. His words were applauded by the rest of the audience at the Starlite Occident festival with an ovation. In this way, the 82-year-old singer from Granada reappeared on stage on Saturday night just a few weeks after the accident that forced him to cancel several concerts of his The Last Waltz tour.

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The performer of immortal songs like Santa Lucía or Todo a pulmón interrupted his performance to put on the kufiyah and deliver a speech against fascism “because we will go back to the way things were before”: “We all know who the bad guys are.” It was then that part of the audience began to boo him. Even from the front rows, shouts were heard like: “We came to hear you sing, not to have you do politics.” “I am a political being because I am alive,” the artist stated. “I am talking about humanism, I am not talking about colors.”

Ríos insisted that he was not talking about any political party. “How am I going to keep quiet because you don’t share my ideas? Respect my ideas as I respect yours,” the artist continued, annoyed by the situation: “If you don’t like this, why did you come, man?”

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Furthermore, the artist announced that he was going to recite Prayer, a poem by the director of the Cervantes Institute, poet and essayist Luis García Montero. Ríos explained that the author wrote it in 2003 with the intention of stopping the Iraq war, and noted that today he recovers that same spirit to denounce the current situation in Gaza and call for its end.

With that introduction, he gave way to the poem, recalling that its message remains relevant. Then, Ríos recited some of its verses: “Because you renounce your war, I renounce my doubts… And I write God, justice, world. And I ask you for charity. I beg you. Hear me.” Thus, he insisted that history tends to repeat itself and emphasized the importance of keeping alive the memory of the mobilizations against the invasion of Iraq.

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