Trini Lopez (1937-2020)
Photo:GAB Archives / Redferns / Getty Images
As Trinidad Lopez III. he grew up in poor conditions in Texas as the son of Mexican immigrants. He started making music professionally at the age of 15 and got a contract with Columbia Records with his first band, The Big Beats. Frank Sinatra later saw him performing and signed him to his record company Reprise Records.
Lopez's renditions of "If I Had a Hammer", "Lemon Tree" and "La Bamba" became hits in the 1960s. He recorded dozens of albums, became a fixture in Las Vegas for a while, and toured around the globe. Lopez was one of the first pop stars of Latin American origin to achieve worldwide success.
He also starred in major Hollywood productions, including Robert Aldrich's wartime epic "The Dirty Dozen" (1967). He took on the title role for Claudio Guzman's film "Antonio" (1973). Later he was mainly seen in television productions, for example in the police series "Adam-12".
As reported by the industry magazine "Hollywood Reporter", Trini Lopez died on Tuesday in a hospital in Palm Springs, California. According to his colleague and business partner Joe Chavira, he succumbed to the consequences of the lung disease Covid-19. He was 83 years old.
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