# Yma Sumac dies



## msegers (Oct 17, 2008)

This election day (USA) began for me with the sad news that Yma Sumac had died. I wonder, are there any recordings of her singing opera or other classics? She had such a great voice, but she seems to have wasted it. If you aren't familiar with "Amy Camus" (there was a rumor that, instead of being Peruvian, as she was, or an Inca princess, which she wasn't, that she was a good Brooklyn girl named Amy Camus, whose agent reversed her name and gave her an exotic biography), here are some samples from YouTube:

Chuncho (a showpiece of her range)

Jungla (50's lounge styling, but her voice soars anyway)

Pachamama (clip from her film _Secret of the Incas_)

Ataypura (clip from _Secret of the Incas_)

I'm hope that this election day will end with some good news.


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## Guest (Nov 4, 2008)

Didn't she have a range of about four and a half octaves ?


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## marval (Oct 29, 2007)

That is a shame, it is always sad to hear of a death, still she was 86, so had a good life.


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## msegers (Oct 17, 2008)

Wikipedia refers to her"extreme vocal range, 'well over four octaves,' which was commonly claimed to span four and even five octaves at her peak." Nicholas E. Limansky in his _Yma Sumac: The Art Behind the Legend_ says that she was able to use most of her range for over four decades.

Yes, as marval says, she had a good life, but still, as he says, it is always sad to hear of a death. If nothing else, it gives me pause to consider my own life.


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## Mr. Terrible (Oct 17, 2008)

remember hearing her when I was a kid and being blown away by her power and her range.

Still, she did have a good innings, didn`t she?


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

I do remember seeing her on a grainy B&W TV when I was very little - too little to know you couldn't make those sounds. She was a human theremin. I had since forgotten her until I saw the title of the post. Although it is under sad circumstances, there is always a sense of wonder when a dormant memory is revived like this.


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## Lang (Sep 30, 2008)

Funnily enough I was thinking about her a month ago, and played some of her work on YouTube for my daughter. She was a phenomenal singer, and it's a shame she didn't (so far as I know) include classical works in her repertoire.


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## marval (Oct 29, 2007)

This is an extract from an interview she gave.

Yma Sumac : "Yes, I knew opera since my childhood, I sang opera at the age of eighteen years. But I preferred to sing Peruvian music, the people listened me to sing opera, all those that contracted me to sing opera paid me fabulous amounts of money, but I preferred to demonstrate the Peruvian music but in my own style, not of a singsong way, you know that it's necessary to enrich the music.... any music. I did it..... I had a very great successful, until today. Since my childhood I liked the music and the opera."


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