Grammy Award Winning Singer, Cesaria Evora of Cape Verde dies at age 70

     Gramming award winning singer Cesora Evora  has died . Evora who started singing as a teenager in the bayside bars of Cape Verde  in the 1950s and won a Grammy in 2003 after she took her African islands music to stages across the world, died Saturday at 70.
      Evora known as the "Barefoot Diva" because she always performed without shoes  died in the Baptista de Sousa Hospital in Mindelo, on her native island of Sao Vicente in Cape Verde, her label Lusafrica said in a statement on its website. 

    In recent years she had had several operations, including open-heart surgery last year and retired in September because of the  health problems.Evora was considered one of the world's greatest exponents of Morna, a form of blues considered the national music of the Cape Verde islands, a former Portuguese colony which gained independence in 1975.

 She was recently listed as one of Africa's biggest stars by CNN alongside Nigeria's Asa ,Tuface and Nneka.

   Two days of national mourning has been declared in the small island nation, with President Jorge Carlos Fonseca calling her "one of the major cultural references of Cape Verde".

Cesaria Evora  had a son and a daughter by different men but never married.