Marina Xavier died on Nov. 6, 2025, at Singapore General Hospital. She was 68. Her niece, singer Karen Xavier, says Marina had battled stomach cancer before — it went into remission for a while but came back in 2024.
If you remember Singapore’s jazz clubs from the 1980s and ’90s, Marina’s voice probably lives in the back of your head: warm, husky, and a little bit dangerous in the best way. She could make a line of lyrics sound like a wink. And sure, she was glamorous — but she was never all gloss. There was grit there, too. Musicians and friends describe her as smoky, swingy, and wildly alive onstage.
A life in quick phrases (because she sang like that)
- Born in Singapore to a Dutch-Portuguese mother and a Burmese-Indian father.
- Cut her teeth in local clubs — think Carriage Bar at the York Hotel in the early 1980s.
- Moved to Paris in 1989 and split time between Europe and Singapore for decades.
- Released several albums that moved between jazz, Latin, pop and dance. One notable record is A Jazzy Christmas in Paris.
The music — short, sharp, and memorable
Marina’s catalog blended genres the way a stylish person blends accessories: with confidence. She topped charts with tracks that flirted with world music and pop as much as jazz. Songs like “Do The Dut (Dangdut)” and a radio hit called “Made in India” showed that she could pivot from club jazz to dance-friendly tunes without losing her identity. Her 2003 jazz album When the World Was Young even had to be repressed multiple times after selling out.
She also had collaborations and multicultural detours that read like a passport. Big-picture: Marina didn’t stay in one box. She sang in Parisian clubs, performed across Europe and South America, and jammed with a wide circle of musicians. That reach made her both local treasure and international nomad.
The voice and the person
Listen to her and you’ll hear layers: raspy and theatrical one second, intimate the next. Friends called her “kind and chaotic,” “naughty and epic,” and someone who could “move like a cat.” Those descriptions aren’t metaphors — they were shorthand for a singer who gave everything to each phrase. Jacintha Abisheganaden and Jeremy Monteiro — names people in Singapore will nod at — both paid tribute to Marina’s presence and craft.
She carried a cross-cultural charm too. Audiences often felt a mix of “Eurasian warmth” and “European glamour” in her music — a reflection of her roots and the musical lanes she loved.
Little-known (or at least rarely told) bits
Some online posts and community pages say her first recording was a track called “Lagu Cinta,” linked with Tony Fernandes (yes, the same Tony Fernandes who later ran AirAsia). These claims circulate in heritage groups and social posts about Marina’s life; they show how stories about artists sometimes travel first through fans and local memory before broad media picks them up. Treat this one as an interesting claim rather than a verified chapter of her official discography.
Other sources and artist pages list albums and licensing ties that show how her work found homes beyond Singapore — a sign she reached listeners and distributors across borders.
Why Singapore will miss her
Marina wasn’t just another voice. For people who followed the local jazz scene, she was a connecting thread — a performer who brought colour to stages from old-school clubs to commemorative community projects. In September 2024, she joined more than 120 other local jazz musicians for a group photo organised by the Jazz Association (Singapore) — a snapshot that, in hindsight, reads like a who’s-who farewell portrait for a golden generation. Colleagues remember her warmth and how she supported fellow artists.
Her funeral arrangements were made public: a wake at St Joseph’s Church in Victoria Street, followed by a funeral service and cremation on Nov. 10. These details close a chapter that began on small Singapore stages and carried on around the world.
My take
Marina Xavier belonged to an era when singers were performers first: they owned a room, they lived in stories, and they left traces. In our current streaming-playlist era, that kind of presence can feel rare. Marina had it. She mixed glamour with grit, and she did not bend to trends; she folded them into her sound instead.
If you’re under 40, you might have missed her prime years. That’s okay — music survives. Spin one of her albums, watch old footage, and you’ll meet a performer who lived exactly how she sounded: dramatic, unpredictable, and utterly real.
