Angela Bofill, a New York-raised singer whose sultry contralto powered a string of R&B hits within the late Seventies and early ’80s earlier than strokes derailed her profession within the 2000s, died Thursday in Vallejo, California.
His demise, on the dwelling of his daughter, Shauna Bofill Vincent, was introduced in a post on social media by his supervisor, Wealthy Engel. He didn’t specify a trigger.
With a silky mix of Latin, jazz, grownup modern and soul, Bofill is greatest remembered for jazzy love songs like “This time I will be sweeter” and funk-inflected pop numbers like “Something about you.” Armed with a variety of three and a half octaves, her voice was “as chilly as ice cream, creamy, delicately coloured, clean in taste,” as Ariel Swartley wrote in Rolling Stone journal in 1979.
Starting in 1978, Ms. Bofill registered six albums within the High 40 of Billboard’s R&B charts, with 5 of them transferring into the High 100 of the pop charts. She additionally scored seven High 40 R&B singles, together with “Angel of the Night,” (1979) and “Very difficult” (1983).
Angela Tomasa Bofill was born on Might 2, 1954, in New York Metropolis to a Puerto Rican mom and Cuban father, and grew up within the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, Manhattan, and the West Bronx. She began writing songs as a baby.
As a youngster, she was already showcasing her vocal abilities in a duo together with her sister Sandra and a gaggle known as the Puerto Rican Supremes, and in addition as a member of the distinguished All-Metropolis Refrain, a gaggle made up of the most effective highschool singers. within the metropolis’s 5 districts.
After graduating from Hunter College High School in Manhattan in 1972, she created a buzz on town’s membership circuit, singing within the band of the long run Latin Grammy winner Richie Marrero.
She studied on the Hartford Conservatory in Connecticut and graduated from the Manhattan College of Music in 1976. Ms. Bofill labored on the Dance Theater of Harlem as a singer, author and arranger earlier than signing with GRP Information and releasing her critically acclaimed album debut, “Angie,” in 1978.
The album’s signature single, “This Time I will Be Sweeter,” a music beforehand recorded by Martha Reeves, Roberta Flack and others, rose to No. 23 on what was then often called the Billboard soul chart.
In a profile in The Each day Information after the album’s launch, the columnist Pete Hamil highlighted a observe, “Under the Moon and Over the Sky” – one in all 4 songs on the album that Bofill wrote or co-wrote – like “a metropolis dream: lyrical and defiant, with the congas rolling within the center and the sounds of Santeria including an otherworldly contact.”
“You dream of this sort of music on the subway,” he added.
On the time, Bofill nonetheless lived within the West Bronx, the place the city decay spreading throughout the neighborhood was very evident to her.
“It’s so unhappy,” she informed Mr. Hamill. “The place I lived, the identical constructing that was full of individuals is now the effectively. I used to go to a nook sweet retailer and hang around, and that is gone. They seem like the traditional ruins of Rome.”
“Perhaps I will be a part of the answer,” she added. “Even the poorest household has a radio. Even the poorest household can have music.”
Hailed as a uncommon Latin singer to succeed in the R&B charts, Ms. Bofill continued her rise. Their subsequent album, “Angel of the Evening” (1979), was an excellent better industrial and significant success, fueled by the singles “What I wouldn’t do (for the love of you)” and “I attempt”, which she introduced herself on “The Tonight Present Starring Johnny Carson,” together with the title observe.
Clive Davisthe founding father of Arista Information, attracted her to his label in 1981.
Within the mid-Nineteen Eighties, Bofill was dwelling together with her husband, nation artist Rick Vincent, in California’s Napa Valley and elevating her daughter. (The couple divorced in 1994; full details about survivors was not instantly obtainable.)
In a 1985 interview with Ben Fong-Torres, music author for The San Francisco Chronicle, Bofill stated that motherhood not solely grounded her emotionally – “I’m extra assertive; I do know what I need extra” – however it additionally affected her musical skills. “I bought three grades on my higher report,” she stated. “If I had a boy, I might have grow to be quick, who is aware of.”
She launched her newest studio album, “Love in slow motion” in 1996. Her music profession ended when she had strokes in 2006 and 2007 that left her partially paralyzed and with speech issues.
Nonetheless, Bofill not often expressed remorse and tried to be light-hearted when speaking about his misfortunes in interviews. She informed The Washington Submit in 2011 how she was already drained from the pains of the highway earlier than her first stroke.
“I requested God, ‘Give me a break’” she reminded in disjointed syntax. “Inform the reality, I want a break. I am going, going. No break for a very long time. Greater than 26 years, with out relaxation. Sooner or later I prayed, ‘God, I want a relaxation.’ Bam! That’s when the stroke occurred.”
She added: “Subsequent time, God, perhaps one other mild pause.”
