Mocedades
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Mocedades are a Spanish Basque singing group, probably best known for representing Spain in the Eurovision Song Contest in 1973 with the song Eres Tú.
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[edit] Group Formation
In the year 1967 in the Spanish city of Bilbao, eight Basque students decided to form a musical group to be known as Voces y Guitarras ("Voices and Guitars"), citing folk and spiritual music and The Beatles as influences. This group of siblings Amaya Uranga, Estibaliz Uranga, Izaskun Uranga, Roberto Uranga, brothers Rafael Blanco and Sergio Blanco, José Ipiña and Francisco "Paco" Panera spent a year performing around their hometown before sending a demo cassette to producer Juan Carlos Calderón in Madrid. He took an immediate interest in the group and renamed them Mocedades ("Youth").
[edit] Eurovision and Worldwide Success
In 1970, both Ipiña (for military service) and Panera (to become a professor at a local university) left Mocedades. Estibaliz Uranga and the Blanco brothers followed in 1971, and in 1972 Ipiña returned and Carlos Zubiaga (from Los Mitos) joined. Javier Garay who had previously belonged to Voces y Guitarras rejoined the group in 1970 after serving in the Spanish military in Africa. It was with this configuration of six (three Uranga siblings, Zubiaga, Garay and Ipiña) that Mocedades achieved its greatest successes.
The group was now on its way to making a remarkable string of hits, most notably "Eres Tú " ("You are"), runner up in 1973 and the next year a massive hit in Europe and the United States of America. The song was re-released in English as "Touch The Wind" in later years. It was subsequently released in German: Das bist Du, French: C'est pour toi, Italian: Viva noi, and Basque: Zu zara.
More hits followed in Latin America and Spain followed, most notably "Tómame o Déjame" ("Take Me or Leave Me"), "El Vendedor" ("The Peddler"), "La Otra España" ("The Other Spain") and "Me Siento Seguro" ("I Feel Sure"). In 1980 Mocedades signed up to CBS Records, now Sony, and recorded more songs for the Spanish-speaking market, including "Ay Amor!" ("Oh Love") and "Amor de Hombre" ("Love of Man"), which was the first Mocedades track to enter English-speaking charts since the smash hit "Eres Tú".
[edit] 1984-Present
In 1984 Amaya Uranga announced her decision to leave Mocedades and was replaced by Ana Bejerano. The albums "Colores" and "Sobreviviremos" were released before Jose Ipiña and Carlos Zubiaga left in 1988. In 1992 "Intimamente", a cover album of pop classics arranged by Carlos Zubiaga, was released and more departures followed in 1993.
Just two of the "Historic Six" Mocedades members were around to record "Suave Luz" in the mid-1990's, and they found three further new members to record with them.
In the late 1990's some compilation albums of Mocedades's hits were released. Another compilation, "Todas de Exitos de Mocedades" ("All of Mocedades' Hits") was released in 2000 and later re-branded as simply "Exitos". A similar compilation followed in 2004, featuring thirty tracks.
[edit] Members
The first date listed in brackets is the year in which the member joined Mocedades - the second date is the year in which they left.
- Amaya Uranga (1969-1984)
- Izaskun Uranga (1969-)
- Estibaliz Uranga (1969-1972)
- Roberto Uranga (1969-1993)
- Sergio Blanco (1969-1972)
- Roberto Blanco (1969-1972)
- Javier Garay (1970-)
- José Ipiña (1969-1970) (1972-1989)
- Francisco Pañera (1969-1970)
- Carlos Zubiaga (1972-1989)
- Ana Bejerano (1985-1993)
- Inaki Uranga (1989-1993)
- José Garcia (1993-1996)
- Inigo Zubizarreta (1993-1996)
- Ines Rangil (1993-1996)
- Arseno Gutiernez (1997-1999)
- Idoia Arteaga (1997-1999)
- Jose Antonio Las Heras (1997-2005)
- Fernando González (1997-2001) (2005-)
- Iratxe Martínez (2001-2005)
- Luis Hornedo (2001-)
- Rosa Rodríguez (2005-)
Twenty-three people in all have been part of Mocedades since its inception.
[edit] Trivia
- Eres Tú was nominated for the 50th anniversary Eurovision concert Congratulations after being selected as one of the 14 most popular songs in Eurovision history, and finished eleventh. Amaya Uranga, Carlos Zubiaga and Jose Ipiña attended the event while Javier Garay and Izaskum Uranga were strangely not invited. Also, by this time, Roberto Uranga had passed away.
- Mocedades has recorded many famous English-language songs, including "Say A Little Prayer", "You've Got A Friend" and "Danny Boy".
- Although Mocedades was originally a Basque group, all of their major hits were sung in Castilian Spanish. They have also recorded in English, Euskara, French, Latin, Portuguese, German, Italian, Greek, Kimbundo, and more.
[edit] Discography
- 1969 Pange lingua
- 1970 Más allá
- 1971 Otoño
- 1973 Eres tú
- 1973 Eres tu re-released with new songs(2003)
- 1974 Mocedades 5 (1974)
- 1974 Mocedades 5 re-released with new songs(2003)
- 1975 La otra España
- 1976 El Color DeTu Mirada
- 1977 Mocedades 8
- 1978 Kantaldia
- 1978 Mocedades 10
- 1980 Amor
- 1981 Desde que tú te has ido
- 1981 Desde que tú te has ido released in Brazil and Portugal with 2 songs re-done in Portuguese
- 1983 La Mûsica
- 1984 15 Años de Música
- 1984 La vuelta al mundo de Willy fog
- 1986 Colores
- 1987 Sobreviviremos
- 1992 Intimamente
- 1995 Suave luz
- 1997 Mocedades canta a Walt Disney
Release dates in Spain are shown.
[edit] See also
Related acts:
- Sergio y Estíbaliz
- El Consorcio
- Mikel Uranga
[edit] External links
| Selected Eurovision winners/participants for Congratulations | |
|---|---|
| Eurovision winners/participants that participated | ABBA | Brotherhood of Man | Celine Dion | Sertab Erener | France Gall | Dana International | Johnny Logan (twice) | Domenico Modugno | Mocedades | Nicole | Olsen Brothers | Elena Paparizou | Cliff Richard |
| Preceded by Jaime Morey |
Spain in the Eurovision Song Contest 1973 |
Succeeded by Peret |
