2024-09-07 17:35:10
Brazilian musician and pianist Sergio Mendes, who helped export bossa nova to the world, has died in Los Angeles at the age of 83, his family announced Friday.
In a statement, Mendes’ family said the musician “died peacefully” the day before at his home in the American city, surrounded by his wife and children.
“In recent months, his health had been affected by the effects of long-term Covid,” the statement added.
Launched onto the Brazilian scene in the early 1960s in the midst of the bossa nova wave, Sergio Mendes quickly rose to fame. His talents as a pianist and composer of arrangements aroused the interest of Antonio Carlos Jobim.
His mastery of jazz impressed the American saxophonist Cannonball Adderley and chose his group, “Sexteto Rio”, to record the album “Cannonball’s Bossa Nova” in 1963.
Three years later, Mendes achieved great international success with his album “Sergio Mendes & Brasil ’66” and the since-famous “Mas Que Nada”, an adaptation of a song by Jorge Ben.
He recorded more than 35 albums and toured with major American artists such as Frank Sinatra. He is also the Brazilian with the most songs (14) in the Top 100 of the American charts, according to the Brazilian presidency.
“Rest in peace, dear genius,” said Milton Nascimento, an icon of Brazilian popular music and one of the first celebrities to react to Mendes’ death, on Instagram.
“There were many years of friendship, collaboration and music” between the two, he added.
– Curiosity and spontaneity –
Nascimento’s message was followed by tributes from personalities inside and outside Brazil.
“In this moment of sadness, I stand in solidarity with the family, friends and fans of Sergio Mendes,” President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva wrote in a statement.
“He was one of the greatest exponents and promoters of our music and culture in the world,” he added.
Black Eyed Peas frontman and rapper Will.i.am paid tribute to the pianist in three Instagram stories, one of which included a photo of the two of them walking and the message, “A friendship that will last forever.”
The American group made a remix of “Mas Que Nada” in 2006, when they were at one of their best moments, giving a new air to the remembered song.
Throughout his career, Mendes continued to tap into the inexhaustible vein of captivating music, in which he skillfully blended the cadence of samba, the groove of jazz, the subtle vocal harmonies of bossa nova and the refinement of Californian pop.
He won the World Music Grammy in 1993 for the album “Brasileiro,” which includes several compositions by his compatriot Carlinhos Brown, with whom he was nominated for an Oscar almost two decades later for the song “Real in Rio,” from the animated film “Rio.”
However, behind the famous musician and the commercial aspect of his songs, sometimes bordering on “easy listening”, there was an artist endowed with great spontaneity.
“I’m very curious, I like to learn, that’s why I speak French by ear,” Sergio Mendes said in an interview with AFP in Paris in 2014.
“The roots of my music are Brazilian. In Brazil we have a beautiful cultural and musical diversity, between the music of Bahia, Rio de Janeiro, classical music, rhythms from Africa,” he said.
© Agence France-Presse
