Ana María Francisca Adinolfi (known by her stage name, Violeta Rivas; 4 October 1937 – 23 June 2018) was an Argentine singer and actress. In the sixties she was the most famous and popular singer of Argentina who recorded hits like Qué suerte! and El cardinal and was best known for singing in the music program El Club del Clan.
Violeta Rivas was born in Chivilcoy (Buenos Aires province), and her official biography assures that she learned to sing at the same time that she learned to speak. When she was still Adinolfi, her audience was her own family, and her repertoire was the popular Italian canzonettas at the time. But from very early on it was quite clear that the girl had an artistic “something” that made her special: her debut on stage was at the young age of 5, at the Metropol theater in her hometown.
With time she began to train and took classes in lyrical singing and piano. She participated in a very famous program at the time, La pandilla de Marilyn, aimed at discovering children's talents (names that would be great also passed through there, such as the actress, singer and broadcaster Nelly Prince and Alberto Migré,. legend of the Argentine telenovela). By 1960 the Metropol girl was already an artist, hired by two important radio stations at the time, El Pueblo and Radio Argentina.
In 1960 she recorded an audition for the RCA record company, with two songs sung in Italian: "Anima e cuore" and "Vorrei", which sought to follow the path of success of singers like Mina and Rita Pavone. As soon as she signed her first record deal, she began to use the stage name by which she would be known.
The definitive leap to fame came with El Club del Clan, the program with which the record companies imposed on popular taste "the new wave", music that represented an "entertaining" way of being young, a domesticated rebellion, or in any case, much more innocuous than the one that was presented in current times. Raúl Lavié, Jonny Tedesco, Palito Ortega and Chico Novarro also shone there; The latter were the authors of “¡Qué Suerte!”, which was one of Rivas's greatest hits, and which the singer presented during a tour in Uruguay with the two artists. The figure of Rivas was then inevitably linked to the Club del Clan (which was strictly an invention of the Ecuadorian record producer Ricardo Mejía), but later he knew how to transcend other genres, especially melodic.
Rivas thus went far beyond that original brand of the Nuevaolera youth. During her more than fifty years of career she issued more than thirty albums, participated in dozens of television programs and musical comedies. She also acted in the cinema, in films such as ¡Viva la vida !; Good night, Buenos Aires; Spring Fever (with Palito Ortega) and Born to sing. She also starred in My secretary is crazy, crazy, crazy. By 1965, after developing a successful solo career, Rivas toured Latin America singing melodic songs.
In Buenos Aires she starred in the local versions of the musicals The Sound of Music and 42nd Street. As an imprint and personal brand, she is always remembered wearing striking dresses, very colourful and flowered, perhaps too “daring” for the parcels of the time.
As part of the vernacular "artistic colony", her marriage to the tango singer Néstor Fabián was also well known. When they were married in church - in 1967 - they had a big party at the City Hotel that made headlines and made news for several days. Also the birth of her daughter Analía and even her first haircut were recorded by the cameras of Sábados Circulars, Pipo Mancera's very popular program. As a sign of times when television could reach a border of bizarre, this latest and capillary event was followed live by millions of viewers. The marriage remained together - and far from scandals and gossip shows - until the day of the singer's death.
Even when her time of great fame ended around 1970, she continued to perform regularly, as a soloist or with her husband, demonstrating her great voice. In her private life, she always handled herself with discretion and remained oblivious to scandals. Rivas, who always considered herself a "neighbourhood girl," even in her heyday, kept her humility. In fact, when she celebrated over 50 years of her career, she was still surprised with what her music generated: "I can't believe that at this point in my career people continue to follow me so much. I thank life and God for that unconditional love".
In September 2013, Rivas was declared an Outstanding Personality of Culture by the Buenos Aires Legislature. From 2014 Rivas health began to fail with the onset of Alzheimer’s disease and kidney infections.. She had been secluded at home for these reasons and had hardly any contact with those closest to her. She was admitted to the Guemes Sanitorium in Buenos Aires during the summer of 2018 where she was hospitalized until her death on June 23, 2018 age 80, from cardiac arrest. (Edited mainly from Pagina 12.com)