CESARIA EVORA - RIP

ONE OF MY FAVORITE SINGERS HAS DIED:

Cesaria Evora, who started singing as a teenager in the bayside bars of Cape Verde in the 1950s and won a Grammy in 2003 after she took her African islands music to stages across the world, died Saturday. She was 70.   

Evora, known as the "Barefoot Diva" because she always performed without shoes, died in the Baptista de Sousa Hospital in Mindelo, on her native island of Sao Vicente in Cape Verde, her label Lusafrica said in a statement on its website. It gave no further details.  

 ... She sang the traditional music of the Cape Verde Islands off West Africa, a former Portuguese colony. She mostly sang in the version of creole spoken there, but even audiences who couldn't understand the lyrics were moved by her stirring renditions, her unpretentious manner and the music's infectious beat. Her singing style brought comparisons to American jazz singer Billie Holiday. "She belongs to the aristocracy of bar singers," French newspaper Le Monde said in 1991, adding that Evora had "a voice to melt the soul." 

ANOTHER JAZZ GREAT CAME FROM CAPE VERDE: HORACE SILVER. THE SAME MELANCHOLY SEEMS TO WEAVE ITS WAY THROUGH MUCH HIS MUSIC:


 

THE MELANCHOLIA... IT'S THE HEART OF SOUL. HE HAD IT. SHE HAD IT.

RIP CESARIA.