Sabrina Salerno (born 15 March 1968 in Genoa, Italy), also known in her singing career as Sabrina, is an Italian singer, television hostess, model, actress and record producer. She's best known for her 1987 hit single "Boys (Summertime Love)" as well as for explicit music videos and performances often exposing nudity.
After winning a beauty contest in her native region, Liguria, Sabrina started modelling, and in 1984 made her television debut in the Italian prime time show Premiatissima on Canale 5. The following year, her debut single "Sexy Girl", sung in English, was released. Produced by Claudio Cecchetto/Joseph Paduano, it became a top 20 hit in her native Italy as well as in Germany.
In late 1987, she released her first album, Sabrina, which was entirely sung in English. In addition to "Sexy Girl", the album included Sabrina's international top five hit "Boys (Summertime Love)" (#1 in France, Switzerland and Spain, #3 in the UK Singles Chart) which has sold more than 1.5 million copies to date worldwide, and "Hot Girl", a top 20 hit in some European countries. Initially, in the UK the BBC banned the video for "Boys" until it was edited. The reason for the ban was that it showed Sabrina dancing in a swimming pool wearing a bikini, as she was dancing her bikini top kept slipping down revealing some nipple. This trick would become a frequent element of her subsequent music clips and live performances.
In 1988, Sabrina received "The Best European Singer" award during the Festivalbar event, and enjoyed another European-wide summer hit with the single "All of Me (Boy Oh Boy)" (produced by Stock, Aitken & Waterman). Later in that year, her second album, Super Sabrina, was released, and she established herself as a European sex symbol thanks to the raunchy videos that accompanied hits such as "My Chico" (#1 in Italy) and "Like a Yo-Yo" (produced by Giorgio Moroder). The latter became the TV theme of Odiens, a very popular Italian Saturday prime time TV show, in which Sabrina also starred.
Thanks to the success of the albums and her sexy image, she was invited to perform in several European TV shows and concerts such as the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1988. Another famous performance was in 1989 at the Olympic Stadium in Moscow, where fifty-thousand people gathered over three days to enjoy Sabrina's show and music. In 1989, she starred in the Italian movie Fratelli d'Italia directed by Neri Parenti, with actors such as Christian De Sica, Jerry Cala, Massimo Boldi, and released a remix album called Super Remix, as well as a new single, "Gringo".
Sabrina Salerno - Boys
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