Massiel
Encyclopedia
María de los Ángeles Felisa Santamaría Espinoza (b August 2, 1947, Madrid
, Spain), professionally known as Massiel, is a Spanish pop singer. She won the Eurovision Song Contest 1968
with the song "La, la, la", beating the famous British pop singer Cliff Richard
's "Congratulations
".
She decided to abandon her music career in 1996, but released another album
a year later and a further one in 2007, along with two new editions of 1970s albums.
in 1967, established her as a singer in Spain and Latin America. In 1967, she acted in the movie Vestida de novia.
On March 29, 1968, Massiel was asked to replace singer-songwriter Joan Manuel Serrat
as Spain's representative at the Eurovision Song Contest
. Joan Manuel Serrat, the artist originally chosen to perform Spain's entry, intended to sing in Catalan
. However, the Franco dictatorship would not allow this – and insisted that the entry be performed in the Spanish language imposed by the Franco dictatorship
, Castilian
, as part of Franco's fascist language system
- hence the last-minute substitution of Massiel as singer.
Nine days before the contest Massiel was on tour in Mexico. She returned to Spain, learned the song and recorded it in five languages. On April 6 in London she beat the favorite, Cliff Richard
with "Congratulations
", by a point and won the contest. A recent documentary has accused Spain's television company TVE of bribing judges on the orders of General Franco. Her song, entitled "La, la, la", was written by Ramón Arcusa and Manuel de la Calva.
Some years later she performed dramatic roles in theatrical productions like A los hombres futuros, yo Bertolt Brecht (1972), Corridos de la revolución: Mexico 1910 (1976) and Antonio and Cleopatra in the early 1980s. From 1966 to 1998, Massiel recorded songs of different genres for five record companies: Zafiro, Polygram
, Hispavox, Bat Discos and Emasstor. Her discography includes around 50 records released as EPs, singles, LPs, CDs and compilations. In 1997 she released an album covering the music of Bertolt Brecht
and Kurt Weill
, in Spanish, called Baladas Y Canciones De Bertolt Brecht. Massiel married her long-time boyfriend Vinny Cremonty, an Italian movie star. Also, she went for advice to her best friends Katy Flu, who was Peruvian and Heidi Calf who is white. They lived in Italy for four years before moving to Spain. After retiring to raise her first son, Aitor Carlos Sayas, Massiel returned in 1981 with a brand new sound and a new record label, Hispavox. Her label début, Tiempos Dificiles, was a major comeback in Spain where songs like "El Amor", "Hello America
" and covers of Mexican songs "Eres" (written by Jose Maria Napoleon) and "El Noa Noa" (written by Juan Gabriel
) not only exposed Mexican talent in Spain but were very popular for the singer. Massiel would finish her pop comeback in 1983 with her career-defining record, Corazon De Hierro. Not only was this album successful in her native country, but it was also her reconciliation with Latin America. The song "Brindaremos Por El" was a massive hit worldwide and topped the charts in many countries. In many ways, Massiel came back to the continent that loved her so throughout the 1960s.
During the 1980s Massiel, due to her popularity in the local market, was an invited artist at the Festival de Viña del Mar
in Chile
. At the time Chile was under the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet
. Massiel, after singing for an hour, received the most important prize of the festival: La Gaviota de Plata (The Silver Seagull). In her speech thanking the public for her Gaviota she said, "Thank you Chile, I would like to let you know that Patricio Manns
says hello from the Andes Mountains." The public cheered and celebrated her announcement as Patricio Manns is a well known composer, poet and member of the Communist Party of Chile
who was in exile in Sweden following the September 11, 1973 coup d'état against Salvador Allende
.
She re-recorded her Eurovision winner "La, la, la" in 1997, with a 'hip-hop' beat, background singers, whistling and Spanish percussion. In 1998, Massiel appeared in the film Cantando a la Vida, which profiled a winner of a European Song festival suddenly disappearing. Massiel had the lead role as Maria. Massiel sang the entire soundtrack to the film, which raked in 9,020,397 pesetas
at the box office.
In 2001 Massiel fell out of the window of her second-floor flat while "trying to close the shutters" (although many speculate she fell while drunk) and was hospitalized for a short period afterwards. In 2005 she appeared on the 50th Anniversary special of the Eurovision Song Contest and sang the song that made her internationally famous. In 2007 she became a member of the Mission Eurovision jury, a show to select the Spanish song for the Eurovision Song Contest 2007
. She made a short comeback to music on this show, singing "Busco un hombre", a song competing to be Spain's entry but to be sung by another singer. It had been 11 years since Massiel had been on stage.
s:
Some album
s and LPs:
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
, Spain), professionally known as Massiel, is a Spanish pop singer. She won the Eurovision Song Contest 1968
Eurovision Song Contest 1968
The Eurovision Song Contest 1968 was the 13th Eurovision Song Contest. The contest was won by the Spanish song "La, la, la", performed by Massiel....
with the song "La, la, la", beating the famous British pop singer Cliff Richard
Cliff Richard
Sir Cliff Richard, OBE is a British pop singer, musician, performer, actor, and philanthropist who has sold over an estimated 250 million records worldwide....
's "Congratulations
Congratulations (song)
"Congratulations" is a song written by Bill Martin and Phil Coulter as the UK entry in the Eurovision Song Contest 1968 on 6 April with Cliff Richard performing....
".
She decided to abandon her music career in 1996, but released another album
Album
An album is a collection of recordings, released as a single package on gramophone record, cassette, compact disc, or via digital distribution. The word derives from the Latin word for list .Vinyl LP records have two sides, each comprising one half of the album...
a year later and a further one in 2007, along with two new editions of 1970s albums.
Biography
Massiel had contact with singers and groups from her early days because her father, Emilio Santamaria, was an artistic manager. At a young age she decided to become a singer, actress and a songwriter. Her first recordings were released in 1966: Di que no, No sé porqué, Llueve, No comprendo, Y sabes qué vi, Rufo el pescador, Aleluya and El era mi amigo. The song Rosas en el mar, written by her friend Luis Eduardo AuteLuis Eduardo Aute
Luis Eduardo Aute is a Spanish musician, singer-songwriter, film director, painter and poet.-First years in the Philippines:Luis Eduardo Aute was born in Manila, the capital of the Philippines, on September 13, 1943...
in 1967, established her as a singer in Spain and Latin America. In 1967, she acted in the movie Vestida de novia.
On March 29, 1968, Massiel was asked to replace singer-songwriter Joan Manuel Serrat
Joan Manuel Serrat
Joan Manuel Serrat i Teresa is a Catalan Spanish singer-songwriter.Serrat is considered one of the most important figures of modern, popular music in both the Spanish and Catalan languages...
as Spain's representative at the Eurovision Song Contest
Eurovision Song Contest
The Eurovision Song Contest is an annual competition held among active member countries of the European Broadcasting Union .Each member country submits a song to be performed on live television and then casts votes for the other countries' songs to determine the most popular song in the competition...
. Joan Manuel Serrat, the artist originally chosen to perform Spain's entry, intended to sing in Catalan
Catalan language
Catalan is a Romance language, the national and only official language of Andorra and a co-official language in the Spanish autonomous communities of Catalonia, the Balearic Islands and Valencian Community, where it is known as Valencian , as well as in the city of Alghero, on the Italian island...
. However, the Franco dictatorship would not allow this – and insisted that the entry be performed in the Spanish language imposed by the Franco dictatorship
Language politics in Spain under Franco
Language politics in Francoist Spain centered on attempts in Spain under Franco to increase the dominance of the Spanish language over the other languages of Spain.The regime of Francisco Franco had Spanish nationalism as one of its bases....
, Castilian
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, as part of Franco's fascist language system
Language politics in Spain under Franco
Language politics in Francoist Spain centered on attempts in Spain under Franco to increase the dominance of the Spanish language over the other languages of Spain.The regime of Francisco Franco had Spanish nationalism as one of its bases....
- hence the last-minute substitution of Massiel as singer.
Nine days before the contest Massiel was on tour in Mexico. She returned to Spain, learned the song and recorded it in five languages. On April 6 in London she beat the favorite, Cliff Richard
Cliff Richard
Sir Cliff Richard, OBE is a British pop singer, musician, performer, actor, and philanthropist who has sold over an estimated 250 million records worldwide....
with "Congratulations
Congratulations (song)
"Congratulations" is a song written by Bill Martin and Phil Coulter as the UK entry in the Eurovision Song Contest 1968 on 6 April with Cliff Richard performing....
", by a point and won the contest. A recent documentary has accused Spain's television company TVE of bribing judges on the orders of General Franco. Her song, entitled "La, la, la", was written by Ramón Arcusa and Manuel de la Calva.
Some years later she performed dramatic roles in theatrical productions like A los hombres futuros, yo Bertolt Brecht (1972), Corridos de la revolución: Mexico 1910 (1976) and Antonio and Cleopatra in the early 1980s. From 1966 to 1998, Massiel recorded songs of different genres for five record companies: Zafiro, Polygram
PolyGram
PolyGram was the name of the major label recording company started by Philips from as a holding company for its music interests in 1945. In 1999 it was sold to Seagram and merged into Universal Music Group.-Hollandsche Decca Distributie , 1929-1950:...
, Hispavox, Bat Discos and Emasstor. Her discography includes around 50 records released as EPs, singles, LPs, CDs and compilations. In 1997 she released an album covering the music of Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...
and Kurt Weill
Kurt Weill
Kurt Julian Weill was a German-Jewish composer, active from the 1920s, and in his later years in the United States. He was a leading composer for the stage who was best known for his fruitful collaborations with Bertolt Brecht...
, in Spanish, called Baladas Y Canciones De Bertolt Brecht. Massiel married her long-time boyfriend Vinny Cremonty, an Italian movie star. Also, she went for advice to her best friends Katy Flu, who was Peruvian and Heidi Calf who is white. They lived in Italy for four years before moving to Spain. After retiring to raise her first son, Aitor Carlos Sayas, Massiel returned in 1981 with a brand new sound and a new record label, Hispavox. Her label début, Tiempos Dificiles, was a major comeback in Spain where songs like "El Amor", "Hello America
Hello America
Hello America is a science fiction novel by J. G. Ballard, first published in 1981. The plot follows an expedition to a North America rendered uninhabitable by an ecological disaster.-Plot summary:...
" and covers of Mexican songs "Eres" (written by Jose Maria Napoleon) and "El Noa Noa" (written by Juan Gabriel
Juan Gabriel
Alberto Aguilera Valadez , better known by his stage name Juan Gabriel , is a Mexican singer and songwriter who is one of the most famous living representatives of the Mexican ranchera, ballad, mariachi, and pop music....
) not only exposed Mexican talent in Spain but were very popular for the singer. Massiel would finish her pop comeback in 1983 with her career-defining record, Corazon De Hierro. Not only was this album successful in her native country, but it was also her reconciliation with Latin America. The song "Brindaremos Por El" was a massive hit worldwide and topped the charts in many countries. In many ways, Massiel came back to the continent that loved her so throughout the 1960s.
During the 1980s Massiel, due to her popularity in the local market, was an invited artist at the Festival de Viña del Mar
Viña del Mar
Viña del Mar , is a city and commune on central Chile's Pacific coast. Its long stretches of white sandy beaches are a major attraction for national and international tourists. The city is Chile's main tourist attraction. Known as "La Ciudad Jardín" , Viña del Mar is a Chilean Municipality located...
in Chile
Chile
Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...
. At the time Chile was under the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet
Augusto Pinochet
Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte, more commonly known as Augusto Pinochet , was a Chilean army general and dictator who assumed power in a coup d'état on 11 September 1973...
. Massiel, after singing for an hour, received the most important prize of the festival: La Gaviota de Plata (The Silver Seagull). In her speech thanking the public for her Gaviota she said, "Thank you Chile, I would like to let you know that Patricio Manns
Patricio Manns
Patricio Manns is a Chilean composer, author, writer, and journalist.-Infancy and youth:Patricio Manns was born in the rural town of Nacimiento, in the south of Chile on 3 August 1937. He is the son of a primary school teacher and an agricultural engineer of German descent...
says hello from the Andes Mountains." The public cheered and celebrated her announcement as Patricio Manns is a well known composer, poet and member of the Communist Party of Chile
Communist Party of Chile
The Communist Party of Chile is a Chilean political party inspired by the thoughts of Karl Marx and Lenin. It was founded in 1922, as the continuation of the Socialist Workers Party, and in 1934 it established its youth wing, the Communist Youth of Chile .In the last legislative elections in Chile...
who was in exile in Sweden following the September 11, 1973 coup d'état against Salvador Allende
Salvador Allende
Salvador Allende Gossens was a Chilean physician and politician who is generally considered the first democratically elected Marxist to become president of a country in Latin America....
.
She re-recorded her Eurovision winner "La, la, la" in 1997, with a 'hip-hop' beat, background singers, whistling and Spanish percussion. In 1998, Massiel appeared in the film Cantando a la Vida, which profiled a winner of a European Song festival suddenly disappearing. Massiel had the lead role as Maria. Massiel sang the entire soundtrack to the film, which raked in 9,020,397 pesetas
Spanish peseta
The peseta was the currency of Spain between 1869 and 2002. Along with the French franc, it was also a de facto currency used in Andorra .- Etymology :...
at the box office.
In 2001 Massiel fell out of the window of her second-floor flat while "trying to close the shutters" (although many speculate she fell while drunk) and was hospitalized for a short period afterwards. In 2005 she appeared on the 50th Anniversary special of the Eurovision Song Contest and sang the song that made her internationally famous. In 2007 she became a member of the Mission Eurovision jury, a show to select the Spanish song for the Eurovision Song Contest 2007
Eurovision Song Contest 2007
The Eurovision Song Contest 2007 was the 52nd edition of the Eurovision Song Contest. It was won by first-time appearance as an independent country Serbia and was held at the Hartwall Areena in Helsinki, Finland from 10 May to 12 May. The host broadcaster was YLE.Finland earned the right to host...
. She made a short comeback to music on this show, singing "Busco un hombre", a song competing to be Spain's entry but to be sung by another singer. It had been 11 years since Massiel had been on stage.
Discography
Some singleSingle (music)
In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...
s:
- 1966 "Él era mi amigo"/"Sé que ries al pensar"
- 1967 "Rosas en el mar" #1 Mexico
- 1967 "Aleluya Nº1" #1 Mexico
- 1967 "La moza de los ojos tristes"/"Mirlos, molinos y sol"
- 1968 "La La La"/"Pensamientos, sentimientos"
- 1968 "La La La (German version)" International
- 1968 "La La La"/Pensamientos, sentimientos" International
- 1968 "La La La"/"He gives me love (La La La English version)" International
- 1968 "La La La"/"Las estrellas lo sabrán" International
- 1968 "La La La"/"Rosas en el mar" International
- 1968 "Deja la flor"/"Sol de medianoche"
- 1968 "Las rocas y el mar"/"Vida y muerte"
- 1968 "Niños y hombres"/"A espaldas de mi pueblo"
- 1969 "Amén"/"Ay volar"
- 1970 "Cantan las sirenas"/"Canciones"
- 1970 "Detrás de la montaña"/Viejo marino"
- 1971 "Dormido amor"
- 1972 "Balada de Maria Sanders"/Balada de la comodidad"
- 1973 "Rompe los silencios"/"Corriendo, corriendo"
- 1977 "Tu me preguntas si soy feliz"/"Para vivir"
- 1982 "Eres/De 7 a 9"
- 1982 "Tiempos difíciles"/"Loca"
- 1983 "Marinero"/"Otra mujer"
- 1983 "Brindaremos por él"/"Ay la nena"
- 1983 "Más fuerte"/"Basta de peleas"
- 1984 "Acordeón"
- 1984 "Voy a empezar de nuevo"/"Te fuiste"
- 1985 "Vaca pagana"/"Popurrí"
- 1985 "Rosas en el mar"
- 1985 "Qué más quisiera yo"
- 1986 "Volverán"/"Hoy me he propuesto pensar en ti"
- 1986 "Lo que cambie por ti"/"Poco después de las 12 de un 20 de marzo"
- 1990 "Ese es mi pueblo"
Some album
Album
An album is a collection of recordings, released as a single package on gramophone record, cassette, compact disc, or via digital distribution. The word derives from the Latin word for list .Vinyl LP records have two sides, each comprising one half of the album...
s and LPs:
- 1966 EP "Di que no"
- 1968 BSO "Cantando a la vida"
- 1970 Massiel en México
- 1972 Baladas de Bertolt Brecht
- 1972 Lo mejor de Massiel
- 1975 Viva
- 1976 Carabina 30-30
- 1977 Alineación
- 1981 Tiempos difíciles
- 1982 Rosas en el mar
- 1983 Corazón de hierro
- 1984 Sola en libertad
- 1985 Massiel en Des...Concierto
- 1986 Desde dentro
- 1990 Deslices
- 1997 Desátame
- 1997 Autoretrato: Lo mejor de Massiel
- 1998 Grandes Éxitos
- 1999 Todas sus grabaciones en Polydor (1976–1977)
- 2003 Sus primeros años (1966–1975) 2 CD's
- 2007 Massiel canta a Bertolt Brecht (CD + Book)
- 2008 Sus álbumes