Author: AP /Adil BradlowIn this Nov. 16, 2006 file photo, South African singer Miriam Makeba performs on stage at the Avo Session in Basel, Switzerland. The emergency room of the Pineta Grande Clinic in Castel Volturno, Italy, said the singer died early on Monday.
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — Miriam Makeba, the South African singer who wooed the world with her sultry voice but was banned from her own country for more than 30 years under apartheid, died after a concert in Italy. She was 76.
In her dazzling career, Makeba performed with musical legends from around the world — jazz maestros Nina Simone and Dizzy Gillespie, Harry Belafonte, Paul Simon — and sang for world leaders such as John F. Kennedy and Nelson Mandela.
“Her haunting melodies gave voice to the pain of exile and dislocation which she felt for 31 long years,” Mandela said in a statement. “At the same time, her music inspired a powerful sense of hope in all of us.”
He said it was “fitting” that her last moments were spent on stage.
The Pineta Grande clinic in Castel Volturno, near the southern city of Naples, said Makeba died early Monday of a heart attack.
Town Mayor Francesco Nuzzo said Makeba collapsed late Sunday at the end of a concert against organized crime, which has been blamed for the local massacre in September of six immigrants from Ghana.
Makeba had not looked well as she visited an immigrant aid center in Castel Volturno early Sunday afternoon, the mayor said.
The death of “Mama Africa,” as she was known, plunged South Africa into shock and mourning.
