Massiel
| Massiel | |
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Massiel in 1968
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | María de los Ángeles Felisa Santamaría Espinosa |
| Born | 2 August 1947 |
| Origin | Madrid, Spain |
| Genres | Pop, Protest song |
| Occupation(s) | Singer, actress, television personality |
| Instruments | Vocals |
| Years active | 1966–1996, 2006-2007 |
María de los Ángeles Felisa Santamaría Espinosa (born August 2, 1947), professionally known as Massiel, is a Spanish pop singer. She won the Eurovision Song Contest 1968 with the song "La, la, la", beating the 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.
Massiel was born in Madrid, Spain. Her Asturian father, Emilio Santamaria, was an artistic manager, so she was around singers and groups from her earliest childhood, and at a young age she decided to become a singer, actress, and 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 Aute 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. Serrat had intended to sing in Catalan, but 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.
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