Liz Mitchell

Elizabeth Rebecca Pemberton-Mitchell (born 12 July 1952) is a British singer and one of the original singers of the 1970s disco and reggae band Boney M.

Mitchell was born in the parish of Clarendon, British Jamaica. At the age of eleven, in 1963 Mitchell and her family emigrated to Harlesden in London, England. By the end of the decade, she auditioned for Hair and eventually moved to West Berlin to join the German cast, where she replaced Donna Summer. After Hair, Mitchell joined the Les Humphries Singers for a few years and represented West Germany at the Eurovision Song Contest with the Ralph Siegel title "Sing Sang Song". The band was then reduced to only six singers (Mitchell was not one of them) for the show (their usual line-ups consisted of 20 performers and up) and came in 15th place with 12 points, which they regarded as their beginning of the end as a band.

A phone call from Katja Wolff agency in February 1976 persuaded Mitchell to return to West Germany to join a new group being assembled by record producer Frank Farian, which would become known as Boney M. Though the group's initial purpose was simply to lip-synch for TV and discothèque performances of Farian's song "Baby Do You Wanna Bump", Boney M. soon became a legitimate recording group with Mitchell, Marcia Barrett, and producer Farian as the vocal core. Mitchell became Boney M.'s lead vocalist. She remained with Boney M. until the group disbanded in 1986.

After the group split up shortly after their 10th anniversary in 1986, fellow group member Bobby Farrell convinced Mitchell, Maizie Williams and a replacement for Marcia Barrett to re-group for a tour in 1987. A recording contract for the group was also arranged. When Farrell and the replacement singer failed to show up for the rehearsals, Mitchell and Williams recruited singer Celena Duncan and dancer Curt Dee Daran for the tour. As Williams had never sung on Boney M.'s recordings, Mitchell ended up recording the scheduled album on her own.

However, it proved difficult for Mitchell to find a record label to release the album, entitled No One Will Force You. It was released in Spain in the autumn of 1988, supported by the singles "Mandela" (a re-working of Boney M.'s 1979 hit "El Lute") and "Niños De La Playa" ("Children of the Beach"). The latter was also released on Mega Records in Scandinavia, where the group did a tour in October. By this point, Williams had been replaced by Carol Grey.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.