49ers were an Italian house and

Eurodance Euro-Dance (sometimes referred to as Euro-NRG, Euro-electronica or Euro) is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in the late 1980s in Europe. It combines many elements of hip hop, techno, Hi-NRG, house music, and Euro-Disco. This ...

act, featuring producers and

DJs A disc jockey, more commonly abbreviated as DJ, is a person who plays recorded music for an audience. Types of DJs include radio DJs (who host programs on music radio stations), club DJs (who work at a nightclub or music festival), mobile ...

Gianfranco Bortolotti, Luca Cittadini, Diego Leoni and Pieradis Rossini with vocalist Ann-Marie Smith. They were named after the

San Francisco 49ers The San Francisco 49ers (also written as the San Francisco Forty-Niners) are a professional American football team based in the San Francisco Bay Area. The 49ers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the league's Nationa ...

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

team, and because former vocalist Dawn Mitchell was the 49th vocalist to audition. In 1990, two of their songs reached number-one on the US '' Billboard'' Hot Dance Club Play

chart A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent ...

; " Touch Me" and " Don't You Love Me".

Background

Formation and debut album

The project was formed in 1988, by the producer Gianfranco Bortolotti. The debut single, "Die Walküre", was based on a vocal from Freeez's "I.O.U." (although the woman in the

video Video is an electronic medium for the recording, copying, playback, broadcasting, and display of moving visual media. Video was first developed for mechanical television systems, which were quickly replaced by cathode-ray tube (CRT) sy ...

is Josy Gil Persia) and reached #20 on the French Singles Chart. It was followed by "Shadows" one year later. After this, the group recruited Dawn Mitchell to front the act. "Touch Me" was partially based on an

Aretha Franklin Aretha Louise Franklin ( ; March 25, 1942 – August 16, 2018) was an American singer, songwriter and pianist. Referred to as the " Queen of Soul", she has twice been placed ninth in '' Rolling Stone''s "100 Greatest Artists of All Time". Wit ...

sample Sample or samples may refer to: Base meaning * Sample (statistics), a subset of a population – complete data set * Sample (signal), a digital discrete sample of a continuous analog signal * Sample (material), a specimen or small quantity of ...

("Rock-a-Lott"), whilst its

chorus line A chorus line is a large group of dancers who together perform synchronized routines, usually in musical theatre. Sometimes, singing is also performed. Chorus line dancers in Broadway musicals and revues have been referred to by slang terms su ...

was taken from Alysha Warren's song, "Touch Me". "Don't You Love Me" featured a vocal sample from Jody Watley's hit " Don't You Want Me" and peaked at number 78 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100. Other borrowed phrases and hooks are dispersed throughout the accompanying album. It was revealed that Mitchell was Lip-syncing the vocals on "Touch Me". She then provided vocals on five other songs from that album. "Touch Me" became a number 3 hit in the

UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...

in January 1990, whilst "Don't You Love Me" peaked at number 12 and the single "Girl to Girl" peaked at number 31 in that same listing.

The follow-up albums

remix A remix (or reorchestration) is a piece of media which has been altered or contorted from its original state by adding, removing, or changing pieces of the item. A song, piece of artwork, book, video, poem, or photograph can all be remixes. The o ...

album and the stand-alone single "Believe In Me" (which Mitchell co-wrote and sang) was released in 1991. Soon afterwards, Mitchell left the act and was replaced by Ann-Marie Smith. The second album, ''Playing With My Heart'', was released in 1992. The album spawned five singles, "Move Your Feet", "Got to Be Free", "The Message", "Everything" and "Keep Your Love".

Other singles

The single "Rockin' My Body" reached number 31 on the UK Singles Chart. They released four more singles including "Lovin' You", "Baby I'm Yours", "I Got The Music (aka I Got It)" and "Let The Sunshine In". Following this, the act broke up in 1998. In 2010, 49ers briefly returned with a single for Italian label Ego Music, entitled "Je Cherche Apres Titine", which featured samples from Charlie Chaplin's comedy film "Modern Times" from 1936. In September 2012, Gianfranco Bortolotti revived Media Records under new name, Media Songs s.r.l. In 2013, 49ers released a song called "Shine on in love" with a singer Cheryl Porter.

Former members

*Gianfranco Bortolotti - production/arrangement/songwriting (1988–1998) *Luca Cittadini - additional production/arrangement/songwriting (1988-1992) *Diego Leoni - additional production/arrangement/songwriting (1988-1992) *Pieradis Rossini - additional production/arrangement/songwriting (1988–1991) *Alysha Warren (real name: Alyesha Wallen) - lead female (uncredited) vocals on "Touch Me" (1989–1990) *Josy Gil Persia - performer (1988–1990) *Dawn Mitchell - performer - although Mitchell's voice was used on "Don't You Love Me", "I Need You", "Girl to Girl", "How Longer, "I Will Survive" and "Believe In Me". (1989–1991) *Ann-Marie Smith - vocals (1991–2002) *Cheryl Porter - vocals (2013) *Chris Mazelle - vocals (2022)

Discography

Studio albums

Compilation albums

Singles

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:49ers Italian electronic music groups Italian house music groups Italian Eurodance groups Musical groups established in 1988 Musical groups disestablished in 1998