Bassey, Dame Shirley

in full Shirley Veronica Bassey

(born January 8, 1937, Tiger Bay, Cardiff, Wales) glamorous Welsh singer. Renowned for her strident, sultry voice, sequined gowns, and lavish jewelry, she was a forerunner of the score of pop music divas who emerged in the last decades of the 20th century. She was also one of the first black British entertainers to gain national and international fame.

The youngest of seven children of an English mother and a Nigerian father who separated before she was three years old, Bassey grew up in a working-class area of Cardiff, Wales. After leaving school at age 15, she worked in a factory, sang in men's clubs, and performed in touring revues before making her breakthrough in a Christmas show in London in 1955. Landing a record contract, she had her first British hit in 1957 with “Banana Boat Song.”

Among her subsequent U.K. chart toppers were “As I Love You” (1959) and “Reach for the Stars/Climb Every Mountain” (1961), and she continued to have hits in Britain into the 1970s. In the United States she is best known for the theme songs she sang for James Bond movies: “Moonraker” (1979), “Diamonds Are Forever” (1971), and especially “Goldfinger” (1964). In 1977 she won the Britannia Award for Best Female Solo Singer in the Last 50 Years. In 1993 she was made a Commander of the British Empire and in 2000 a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire.