- She famously represented the country when the competition was held in Dublin
- Tavares entered with the song ‘Chamar a Música’, which came in eighth place
Portugal’s entry to the 1994 Eurovision Song Contest Sara Tavares has died aged 45 after a lengthy health battle with a brain tumour.
She famously represented the country when the competition was held in Dublin, entering with the song ‘Chamar a Música’, which came in eighth place.
Tavares passed away in Lisbon on Sunday, according to Portuguese reports, which said her death was announced by her devastated family.
With her song being one of the best results for Portugal at the contest, Tavares and ‘Chamar a Música’ went down in history in her home country.
Her performance received 12 votes from the Spanish jury, and was awarded points by 13 out of the 25 participating nations during that year’s contest.
Portugal’s entry to the 1994 Eurovision Song Contest Sara Tavares (pictured) has died aged 45 after a lengthy health battle with a brain tumour
Tavares was born in Lisbon in 1978. Her career took off when she won the first edition of Chuva de Estrelas in 1994, a talent show in Portugal.
She performed a cover of Whitney Houston’s ‘One Moment in Time’.
In the same year, she followed her victory up with her eighth place finish in Dublin.
Two years later, she released her debut album ‘Sara Tavares & Shout!’, the first of several albums she would release over the next two decades.
Her 2005 album ‘Balance’ earned her a platinum record nomination at the BBC Radio 3 World Music Awards.
She is also known for singing the European-Portuguese version of ‘God Help the Outcasts’ for the Disney movie ‘The Hunchback of Notre Dame’, and in 2000 she won a Portuguese Golden Globe for Best Portuguese Singer in 2000.
Her music borrowed elements from a variety of genres, including funk, soul, gospel and pop, and she named Donny Hathaway, Stevie Wonder, Tina Turner and Aretha Franklin as her favourite childhood artists.
However, she was forced to interrupt her music career for almost ten years when she was first diagnosed with cancer in 2009, returning in 2018.
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