Sergio Mendes, the Brazilian singer, composer, bandleader, and keyboardist who turned a global sensation after shifting to america within the Nineteen Sixties, died, in Los Angeles, on September 5. In line with a press release from the Mendes household, the musician’s “well being had been challenged by the consequences of long run COVID.” Mendes was 83 years previous.
Born within the Brazilian metropolis of Niterói, within the early Nineteen Forties, a younger Mendes studied piano at a neighborhood conservatory earlier than taking part in in nightclubs and touring Brazil in varied bands. He launched his debut album, Dance Moderno, because the bossa nova motion gained tempo in 1961. Excursions of North America and Europe led to collaborations with Cannonball Adderley and Herbie Mann, adopted by a transfer to america, the place he fashioned Sergio Mendes & Brasil ’65. Regardless of continued success in South America, the bossa nova outfit’s first two albums offered poorly in North America, and, on the recommendation of producer Richard Adler, Mendes added two American singers and sang some songs in English. However, it was the landmark Portuguese-language single “Mas Que Nada,” written by the samba legend Jorge Ben, that gave Mendes and the band—then referred to as Brasil ’66 and shortly skipping forward to Brasil ’77—its U.S. breakthrough.
In a beforehand skeptical trade, “Mas Que Nada” and guardian album Herb Alpert Presents: Sergio Mendes & Brazil ’66 lent Mendes a cachet that crested in 1968, when he carried out the Burt Bacharach and Hal David cowl “The Look of Love” on the Academy Awards. The band performed greater and larger reveals—in addition to showcases for Presidents Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard Nixon, plus one on the 1970 Olympics—that added rock heft to a stay setup pushed by his frenetic keyboard work and uproarious percussionists.
Momentum slowed, however Mendes continued to discover trendy and conventional kinds within the ensuing many years, together with with the Bahian-influenced 1992 album Brasileiro—winner of the 1993 Grammy Award for Greatest World Music Album—and the 2010 album of modernized Brazilian classics Bom Tempo. He co-produced the 1983 James Bond theme track “By no means Say By no means Once more,” by Brasil ’66 vocalist Lani Corridor, and collaborated with superstars together with Stevie Surprise, Milton Nascimento, and Seu Jorge. He additionally labored with modern artists like John Legend, on the Oscar-nominated “Actual in Rio,” and the Black Eyed Peas on a “Mas Que Nada” remix. Will.i.am produced that unlikely collaboration’s guardian album, Timeless, on which Mendes carried out alongside Eyrkah Badu, Jill Scott, Justin Timberlake, and plenty of extra. He launched his closing album, In the Key of Joy, in 2019, along with a documentary on his life.
