Maria Mendiola from famous Spanish pop duo Baccara dies aged 69

MARIA MENDIOLA has died aged 69, one half of Spanish pop duo Baccara, who made history by becoming the first Spanish act to have a No1 hit in the UK

Maria Mendiola, the singer and dancer who was one of the members of Spanish pop duo Baccara, according to a statement made public by her family, has died this afternoon, Saturday, September 11, aged 69, at her home in Madrid, “surrounded by her most loved ones. dear ones”.

Baccara achieved huge fame towards the end of the 1970s when their first record ‘Yes Sir, I Can Boogie’, with the distinctive ‘Europop/Disco’ beat selling 25 million copies, and saw the duo top the pop charts around the world in 1977, and became the first Spanish act to have a No1 hit in the UK music charts.

They followed that hit up with another one, ‘Sorry I’m A Lady’, which also had huge success around the world, for a duo who although Spanish, always sang in English, representing Luxembourg in the Eurovision Song Contest in 1978 singing ‘Parle Vous Français?’.

María was a dancer by profession, originally part of the Ballet de Radio Television Española in the 1970s, bumping into Maite Mateos in a hotel in the Canary Islands where they were performing, where the two formed a duo, eventually signed by RCA records in Hamburg, Germany, and the rest is music history, with the finally duo splitting up in 1981.

Cristina Sevilla, her current partner in a revamped Baccara paid this tribute on Instagram, “My dear María, wonderful artist, but above all my friend, she has left us today. I can not articulate words. I can only give thanks for so much love I have received from her, and tell her what I had the opportunity to say so many times in life: I love you”, as reported by sevilla.abc.es.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MgX84NR7x0

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