Rodolfo Aicardi

Marco Tulio Aicardi Rivera (May 23, 1946), who went by the stage name of Rodolfo, was a Colombian tropical music singer whose adventurous forays into Latin American folklore resulted in several crossover hits across the continent. Hailing from Mangangué, Bolivar, Aicardi moved to Medellín as a teenager and quickly decided to pursue a career in music. He made his debut with the tropical outfit El Sexteto Miramar, with whom he released three albums between 1968 and 1969. Throughout the 70s, he rose to prominence first as the lead singer for Los Hispanos and then lent his voice to Los Ídolos and Los Bestiales, before finally putting together his own group, the Peruvian cumbia-inspired Rodolfo y Su Típica RA7. With them, Aicardi achieved massive success through the 1980 single “La Colegiala,” becoming the first Colombian artist to enter the Billboard charts and reaching the top of the charts in Europe thanks to a feature in a Nescafé TV ad. During the 90s, he remained at the forefront of the tropical music scene with the release of the Christmas album Cantares de Navidad (1991), El Cantante De Todos Los Tiempos (1996), and Se Prendió El Fogón (1998). Subsequently, Aicardi released three albums in the early aughts - Fantástico (2000), De Regreso: Tropical y Original (2002), and Así Canta Rodolfo (2003) before a heart attack ended his life in October 2007.

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