Hollywood intersection named after late singer Yma Sumac – Daily News

HOLLYWOOD — A crossroads in Hollywood was dedicated Thursday as Yma Sumac Square, honoring the record-breaking Peruvian singer and one of the most famous performers of exotica music in the 1950s. Nine days have passed since the 100th anniversary of his birth.

Damon Devine, who was Sumac’s representative, personal assistant, makeup artist, and eventual caregiver for the last 11 years of her life, and filed a motion to name the intersection in Sumac’s honor. Alderman Mitch O’Farrell was scheduled to give a speech. 11:00 a.m. Ceremony at the intersection of Hollywood Boulevard and Wilcox Her Ave.

Sumac star at 6445 Hollywood Blvd on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Just east of the intersection. She received her star in 1961 when the Walk of Fame was completed with her first 1,558 stars.

According to her website, she was born Zoila Emperatriz Chavalli Castillo on September 13, 1922 in Callao, Peru, graduated from high school in 1940, and sang at local festivals. In 1942 she joined the Compania Peruana de Arte, a musical group founded by the Peruvian folk musician and composer Moises Vivanco, the year she married.

She chose the name Ima Sumac for her radio debut to try to avoid the wrath of her disgruntled parents that she was singing instead of studying. Her parents discovered Ima Sumac during her live radio performance and were not happy, but with support from other family members and the public, eventually her parents became singers. was persuaded that this was her destiny.

A 1949 performance at New York City’s Blue Angel Supper Club was witnessed by a Capitol Records talent agent. They met her backstage and he asked her to make some demo tapes.

She moved to Hollywood in 1950, changed her stage name to Yma Sumac, and signed to Capitol Records. The first album on her label, Voice of the Xtabay, sold over one million copies in her first year. It was one of the first recordings of exotica, a style of easy-listening music developed by Les Baxter, the musician and composer who recorded the album.

Known for her unique five-octave vocal range — a typical trained singer has a range of about three octaves — Smack recorded five more albums for Capitol by 1959. and performed all over the world, including the Royal Albert Hall, Carnegie Hall, and the Hollywood Bowl. soviet union.

Sumac has sold over 40 million records to date, and this is by a Peruvian singer. She appeared in the 1950s films Secrets of the Incas and Omar Khayyam, her 1951 Broadway musical Hula Hoo Lee, and an episode of her 1955 CBS Variety series Shower of Stars.

Smack sang on NBC’s late-night talk show “Late Night with David Letterman” in 1987 and continued to make concert appearances well into the 1990s. Her music was used in the movie ‘The Big Lebowski’ and the TV series ‘Mad Men’.

Sumac died in 2008 at the age of 86.