Singer-songwriter Concetta Rosa Maria Franconero, also known as Connie Francis, passed away on Wednesday at 87-years-old.
The president of Francis's record label, Concetta Records, Ron Roberts, first broke the news on her official Facebook page on Thursday morning.
"It is with a heavy heart and extreme sadness that I inform you of the passing of my dear friend Connie Francis last night," Roberts wrote. "I know that Connie would approve that her fans are among the first to learn of this sad news."
In an exclusive interview with People Magazine, Roberts said that they were "expecting it".
"We were expecting it, unfortunately...they couldn't locate where the pain was exactly," he said, adding that she was having trouble with her hip, which "she had been having for some time."
In a Facebook post on July 2, Francis announced that she was back in the hospital undergoing tests and checks to "determine the cause(s) of the extreme pain I have been experiencing," she wrote.
"My thanks for your many get well soon messages. I will endeavor to keep you updated," she concluded.
Who was Connie Francis?
Francis was born in Newark, New Jersey, on December 12, 1937, to an Italian-American family. She spent the first few years of her life in Crown Heights, New York, where she learned and became fluent in Yiddish, a language she would later use to record songs in both Yiddish and Hebrew.
In her autobiography, Who's Sorry Now (1984), she wrote about her career, including how many of her professional associates, friends, and audiences were Jewish, and how it felt natural and familial to her, given the similarities between Italian and Jewish cultures.
In August 1959, Francis followed the advice from her father and traveled to London where she recorded an album entirely in Italian at EMI's famous Abbey Road Studios. The album, Connie Francis Sings Italian Favorites, was released in November 1959 and soon hit the album charts for 81 weeks, peaking at number four. Her single, "Mama", reached number eight in the United States and number two in the United Kingdom.
Due to her success, she recorded seven more albums of her "favorites" between 1960 and 1964, which included Jewish, German, and Irish songs.
Her 1960 album, Connie Francis Sings Jewish Favorites, included a blend of traditional Jewish songs, such as Havah Negila as well as German and Yiddish, like Mein Shetele Belz and O Mein Papa songs.
Many of the songwriters who worked on the album were Jewish and/or Israeli, including Jack Yellen, an American lyricist and screenwriter who is best remembered for writing "Happy Days Are Here Again".
Going viral on TikTok
One of Francis' many songs, "Pretty Little Baby", had recently gotten the attention of many on the TikTok app, CNN Entertainment reported. Many people in the younger generation used the song in TikTok videos as background, but many have taken her song and added riffs to it in a latest TikTok trend.
One month before her passing, Francis posted a video of her sitting on her couch, holding her dog, and lip-syncing to her famous and trending song, with the caption," First time I've lip-synced to this 63-year-old recording of mine."