RIP: Peruvian Exotic Singer Yma Sumac

Peruvian singer Yma Sumac died Saturday, Nov. 1, 2008 in Los Angeles following an 8-month long battle with colon cancer. She was probably 86.

For years I thought Yma Sumac was a pretender of sorts; her name read backwards would be ‘Amy Camus.’ But before she was Yma Sumac, she was Imma Sumack, a name she gave herself when she left her native Peru and which she claimed meant something like ‘beautiful girl’. She was born Zoila Augusta Emperatriz Chavarri del Castillo; both her birth date and city of birth are controversial because Sumac seemed to reinvent herself as she went along. Whether or not she was, as she claimed, a descendent of the Incan Emperor Atahualpa is anyone’s guess.

Sumac and her husband, bandleader Moises Vivanco, moved to New York in 1946 and in 1950 she signed with Capitol Records, taking the stage name Yma Sumac. Her star rose during the 1950s as she turned Incan and South American folk songs into something exotic, giving them a Hollywood flair and the benefit of her voice, foreign looks and abundant personality. In the 1960s her popularity began to decrease along with the demand for Hollywood-style Latin personalities although Sumac continued to sporadically record, tour and make guest appearances.

She found new fame in the 1990s as her music garnered a young cult following, probably as a result of her music appearing in the soundtracks of many movies, including The Big Lebowski.

Still there’s no doubt that she had an incredible voice, a voice that could span over 4 octaves and which she used not only to sing songs, but also to interpret the sounds of birds, animals, whistles – well, judge for yourself as you watch this famous video recording of “Chunco (The Forest Creatures).” Really, watch it! It's well worth the 3 minutes.

Whether or not you like the exotic music of Yma Sumac, it’s hard to argue that she was one of a kind.

Watch “Chunco (The Forest Creatures)”

* Album cover courtesy The Right Stuff