On her 89th birthday, Google Doodle honours Spanish opera soprano Montserrat Caballé

The Google Doodle for today is a beautiful homage to opera diva Montserrat Caballé, who is arguably best remembered for her duet with Freddie Mercury.

Caballé was born Mara de Montserrat Bibiana Concepción Caballé I Folch on April 12, 1933, in Barcelona. She had a passion for music since she was a child, and she went to music school and took singing classes.

Montserrat Caballé made her professional opera debut in 1956, as a substitute member in a production of Puccini’s La bohème, shortly after migrating to Switzerland.

She steadily increased in prominence across Europe during the next decade.

Cabellé’s big break came in 1965, when she was invited to attend a performance of Lucrezia Borgia at Carnegie Hall in New York City.

This was her debut performance in the “bel canto” style of opera, but she quickly rose to fame and earned the moniker “La Superba.”

She received the Grammy Award for Best Classical Vocal Performance for a rendition of La bohème just three years later.

Montserrat Cabellé was reintroduced to modern audiences in 1987 when she sang a duet with Queen’s Freddie Mercury called Barcelona, which was composed and recorded as the anthem for the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona.

The two performers collaborated on a whole album, which was released the following year.

Caballé has spent a significant portion of her life to charitable work and assisting the poor, having been named a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador and founding a nonprofit to aid destitute children.

Montserrat Caballé died in her birthplace of Barcelona on October 6, 2018.

Montserrat Caballé is seen in a flowery ensemble with roses in the Google Doodle dedicated to her.

The company’s name is written out, with Caballé’s powerful pose forming the middle “oog” of “Google,” as befitting a Google homepage logo.