Still remember when I first heard her voice. I was 14 at the time. Back then I had no idea what an octave range in a human voice means, much less 4 or 5 of them packed into one throat. I only knew her glissandi made my skin crawl ... in a good way.
Think of her commercialized and/or fake Peruvian folk songs what you will (I know I do) but there is something to her self-styled highly artificial stage persona that fits right into the development from Hollywood's pre-color-movie star cult to the fastlane idol hype of today.
Who she really was (she died in 2008)? We'll probably never know. Some say she was born in 1922 , other sources state 1927 or even 1929. She claimed to have been a direct descendant of the last Inca king Atahualpa (killed by the Spanish Conquistadores in the 16th century) and had a willing Peruvian ambassador at hand to back her up on that. She was married at the age of 14 in Lima, other sources say she was married after she moved to New York at the age of 20. Rumours had it, she never went anywhere near Peru before her first concert tour there and was, in fact, little ol' Amy Camus (her name spelled backwards) from Brooklyn, New York. She disappeared in the 50ties without a trace, only to re-emerge in the 1970ties with a new record that showcased her voice in contemporary musical arrangements. Very eery! She was beautiful and childish and proud and self-destructive and pigheaded and reckless and ... fascinating.
Yma Sumac (for reference: Wiki, a fan site, another one and her official site) here singing Pachamama from Secret of the Incas, 1954
And no, this is not a flute nor a violin, it's her voice ... and bad sound quality. Pout.
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