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Elis Regina
Background information
Birth name	Elis Regina Carvalho Costa
Born	March 17, 1945 Porto Alegre, Brazil
Died	January 19, 1982 São Paulo, Brazil
Genre(s)	MPB Bossa Nova
Years active	1961 – 1982

Elis Regina Carvalho Costa (March 17, 1945 – January 19, 1982) was one of the greatest female singers in Brazilian popular music.

Contents 1 Biography 2 Family 3 Discography 3.1 Posthumous releases 4 External links

Elis Regina was born in Porto Alegre, where she began her career as singer at age 11 on a children's radio show, called "O Clube Do Guri" on Rádio Farroupilha. In 1959, she was contracted by Rádio Gaúcha and in the next year she travelled to Rio de Janeiro where she recorded her first LP, Viva a Brotolândia.

She won her first festival song contest in 1965 singing "Arrastão" ("The Trawling Net") by Edu Lobo and Vinícius de Moraes, which, when released as a single, made her the biggest selling Brazilian recording artist since Carmen Miranda. Her second LP with Jair Rodrigues, Dois na Bossa, set a national sales record.

It is said by admirers of her music that she never sang off-key.

In the late '60s and early '70s, Elis Regina helped to popularize the work of the tropicalia movement, recording songs by musicians such as Gilberto Gil. Her 1974 collaboration with Antonio Carlos Jobim, Elis & Tom, is often cited as one of the greatest bossa nova albums of all time. She also recorded songs by Milton Nascimento, João Bosco, Aldir Blanc, Chico Buarque, Jorge Ben, Baden Powell, Caetano Veloso and Rita Lee. She possessed an exciting voice and superb intonation, and excelled at up-tempo numbers and ballads under the banner of Brazilian Popular Music Música Popular Brasileira. Her nicknames were "furacão" ("hurricane") and "pimentinha" ("little pepper").

She sometimes criticized the Brazilian dictatorship which had persecuted and exiled many musicians of her generation. In a 1969 interview in Europe, she said that Brazil was being run by "gorillas". Her popularity kept her out of jail, but she was eventually compelled by the authorities to sing the Brazilian national anthem in a stadium show, drawing the ire of many Brazilian Leftists. She was later forgiven because they understood that, as a mother and daughter, she had to protect her family from the dictatorship at any cost.

When Elis Regina succumbed to an accidental drug-alcohol-tranquilizers overdose in 1982, at the age of 37, she had recorded dozens of top-selling records in her career. Elis Regina has sold 45 million albums.

Her rendition of Jobim / Vinicius' song "Por Toda A Minha Vida" appeared on the soundtrack to the 2002 movie Hable Con Ella (Talk to Her) directed by Pedro Almodóvar, while her song "Roda" appeared on the soundtrack to the 2005 movie Be Cool.

Elis married twice and gave birth to three children. Her first marriage was to Ronaldo Bôscoli in 1967. She gave birth to a son, João Marcelo Bôscoli, in 1970.

She later married her long-time collaborator César Camargo Mariano, and had two more children with him: Pedro Camargo Mariano in 1975, and Maria Rita in 1977. The three children all later became musicians, whose careers were only intermittently successful. After many years of complete obscurity, Maria Rita became a national singing sensation after a lengthy marketing campaign, like her mother, winning three Latin Grammies for her debut eponymous CD. João Marcello Boscoli, owner of the Trama recording company, produced the first Elis Regina DVD allowing many of her fans to see her performing for the first time. The DVD was a recording of a 1973 Brazilian TV show featuring songs and an interview. Boscoli's soul and MPB incursions failed to make an impact. Pedro Camargo Mariano was only noticed when he sang with his father, the brilliant pianist and arranger Cesar Camargo Mariano, on a Latin Grammy-nominated CD called "Piano & Voz" (Piano and Voice). His own records did not meet with commercial success.

• "Viva A Brotolândia" (first album recording in 1961 at age 16)
• "Poema" (1962)
• "Ellis Regina" (1963) (listed with two l's)
• Dois na Bossa (1965)
• O Fino do Fino - Elis & Zimbo Trio (1965)
• Samba, Eu Canto Assim! (1965)
• Dois na Bossa nº2 (1966)
• Elis (1966)
• Dois na Bossa nº3 (1967)
• Elis (1968)
• Elis (1969)
• Elis Regina in London (1969)
• Elis Regina & Toots Thielemans (1969)
• Em Pleno Verão (1970)
• Ela (1971)
• Elis (1972)
• Elis (1973)
• Elis (1974)
• Elis & Tom (1974)
• Falso Brilhante (1976)
• Elis (1977)
• Transversal do Tempo (1978) (live)
• Essa Mulher (1979)
• Elis Especial (1979)
• Saudades do Brasil (1980)
• Elis (1980)
• Montreux Jazz Festival (1982)

• Trem Azul (1982) (live)
• Vento de Maio (1983) (compilation)
• Luz das Estrelas (1984)
• Elis Regina no Fino da Bossa (1994) (live)
• "Dose Dupla-Elis Regina" (1994) (digital compilation of first 2 recordings from 1961 and 1962)
• Elis ao Vivo (1995) (live)
• 20 Anos de Saudade (2002) (compilation)
• Little Pepper: The Definitive Collection (2004) (compilation)
• "Elis Regina: MBP Especial 1973" - black and white DVD released in 2005 (TV show)
• "Elis Regina Carvalho Costa" - full color DVD released in 2006 (live show)
• "Por toda a minha vida" - Brazilian TV GLOBO special in 12/28/2006 (TV show)

• Biography of Elis Regina (Portuguese)
• Biography and discography of Elis Regina (English)