Brazilian musician Sérgio Mendes dies at 83 from lengthy COVID

Sérgio Mendes, the Brazilian musician famend for bringing bossa nova music to a worldwide viewers beginning within the ’60s, has died. He was 83. The information was introduced in a press release by his household, who cited the long-term results of COVID-19 as his reason behind loss of life.

“His spouse and musical associate for the previous 54 years, Gracinha Leporace Mendes, was by his facet, as had been his loving kids,” the household’s assertion learn. “Mendes final carried out in November 2023 to bought out and wildly enthusiastic homes in Paris, London, and Barcelona. For the final a number of months, his well being had been challenged by the consequences of long-term Covid.”

Born on Feb. 11, 1941, in Niterói, Brazil, Mendes educated from a younger age to turn out to be a classical pianist, however quickly fell in love with jazz music and started performing it. In 1962 he traveled to the US for the primary time to participate in a bossa nova pageant at Carnegie Corridor in New York, however his American residence turned extra everlasting following the 1964 navy coup in Brazil.

Primarily based in Los Angeles, his first band, Brasil ’65, met with solely average success. After Mendes recruited two feminine singers (Lani Corridor and Bibi Vogel) and renamed the group Brasil ’66, they had been rather more standard. Specifically, their 1966 single “Mas Que Nada” helped their album Herb Alpert Presents Sergio Mendes & Brasil ’66 (produced by the eponymous trumpeter) go platinum.

“Mas Que Nada” remained so standard over time that Mendes even recorded a brand new model with the Black Eyed Peas in 2006. His band had different successes within the ’60s, together with a canopy of the Beatles‘ “The Idiot on the Hill” in 1968 and a efficiency of Burt Bacharach and Hal David’s “The Look of Love” on the Oscars broadcast that very same yr.

Mendes was himself nominated for Finest Unique Track for “Actual in Rio” from the 2011 animated movie Rio. He additionally received a Grammy within the Finest World Music Album class for his 1993 Brasileiro, and received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Latin Grammys in 2005.

“Sérgio Mendes was my brother from one other nation,” Alpert wrote on Instagram, alongside a black-and-white picture of himself and Mendes on the piano years in the past. “He was a real good friend and intensely gifted musician who introduced Brazilian music in all its iterations to the complete world with magnificence and pleasure.”