BIOGRAPHY
Maria Conchita (full name: Maria Concepcion Alonso Bustillo) - singer, songwriter, actress, former beauty queen and philanthropist - needs no introduction throughout the Latin world and far beyond. She was born in Cienfuegos, Cuba, her family moved to Venezuela when she was five years old, after the Cuban Revolution. Besides her very successful music career with numerous top 10 hits and over 30 years of touring, her life has played out in the media, on stages from Miss World to Broadway, in over 60 movies with stars ranging from Robin Williams to Arnold Schwarzenegger, in the gossip press from the Political world to the Scandal Sheets - people of all backgrounds know everything about her singing, acting, political and celebrity life. She is also a gay icon and is currently touring with both a greatest hits music show and her traveling ‘talk & music’ show ‘Sin Verguenza’. A ‘symphonic’ performance in Houston in October 2024 with the Houston Latin Symphony was a major success. Maria Conchita will be touring in the U.S., Mexico and Latin America in 2025.
In 1982, she emigrated to the United States and made her Hollywood film debut in Paul Mazursky's Moscow on the Hudson (1984), opposite Robin Williams. She also starred in movies such as Touch and Go (1986), Extreme Prejudice (1987), The Running Man (1987), Colors (1988), Vampire's Kiss (1988), Predator 2 (1990) and The House of the Spirits (1993) amongst many, many more. She was nominated for the Independent Spirit Award as Best Leading Actress in 1996 for her role in Caught. She was cast as Lucía on the ABC hit-series Desperate Housewives. She also was part of the Latin version of that show, Amas de Casa Desesperadas, for Univision Network. She continues to act and in 2025 alone will have 3 new movies coming out.
In 1995, she performed as Aurora/Spider Woman in the Broadway production of "Kiss of the Spider Woman", making her the first Latin-born actress to star on the Great White Way. This was a ‘small’ side performance that same year: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DBJ95HvyALm/?igsh=MTc4MmM1YmI2Ng=
Maria Conchita's first album "Love Maniac" (Polygram Vzla) was released in 1979 under the name A'mbar and went gold. It reached #1 on the charts, the first of many of her songs to reach #1. Her second album “The Witch” featured the #1 hit of the same name. Both albums were recorded in English. Her 3rd album was "Dangerous Rhythm" with the hit “Baby, Forget About You”, the only song in Spanish on the album. Soon after, Giorgio Moroder asked her to write the lyrics for and sing "Vamos a Bailar", which he composed for the soundtrack of the film Scarface.
It became one of her best-known songs and a classic among Spanish speakers. Her fourth album, "María Conchita" (A&M 1984) made her an international singing star in the Spanish-speaking market, and garnered the first of three Grammy Award nominations (1985, 1988, 1994). It went Gold and Platinum and had multiple #1’s internationally as well as with her next albums, "O Ella O Yo", "Mírame" and "Hazme Sentir".
In 1994 she released a Boleros album, ”Alejandra” , named after her soap opera composed and produced by Armando Manzanero. She has also released a number of live and greatest hits album.
Alonso sang the United States national anthem at the FIFA UNICEF charity match on July 27, 1986, at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, in front of a crowd of 57,539.
Maria Conchita has close to 1.2M monthly listeners and over 360,000 followers on Spotify, 71.1k You Tube subscribers and well over 1.24M social media followers spread over several different social media accounts. Her two biggest songs on Spotify, “Acariciame” and “Noche de Copas” have a combined total of over 106M Spotify plays, even though their release preceded the launch of the platform.
Quote from Maria Conchita Alonso:
“I believe that your own thoughts can bring about positive or negative effects. So, the people who feel sick all the time are the ones who are going to get sick, and the people who are constantly worried about what's going on around them... are the ones in trouble.”