Trivia

In 1951 she worked Ted Heath's band and other jazz groups, and recorded her version of "Calypso Blues", a song originally performed by Nat King Cole.

She started singing at Quaglino's Restaurant and their Allegro to great success in 1950.

She was buried in Deans Grange Cemetery, Ireland.

She died of natural causes, aged 65, on 25 June 1993 in Dublin, Ireland, where she had lived for a number of years with her second husband, Liam Morrison.

Born in Trinidad on 21 June 1928, one of five sisters, Mona Baptiste emigrated to London in 1948 on the MV Empire Windrush. While she presented herself as a clerk to London immigration, she began working towards her singing career very soon after.

Mona Baptiste was a Trinidad-born singer and actress in London and Germany. She was largely popular from songs such as "Calypso Blues" and "There's Something in the Air".She also acted in multiple musical films, including Dancing in the Sun (Tanz in der Sonne, 1954).

Baptiste retired after her husband died, but in the 1970s she tried to make a comeback, which was unsuccessful.

She appeared in the British music magazine New Musical Express for events such as signing with Cab Kaye to sing with the Cabinettes, appearing on the television show Coloured Follies, and appearing on the British radio variety show Brandbox in 1949.

(Her place of death was erroneously reported as Krefeld in Der Spiegel.) .

In Germany, where she had a house in Krefeld, she gained recognition for her popular songs such as "There's Something in the Air" and movie appearances including in the films Tanz in der Sonne and An jedem Finger zehn in 1954.