Caterina Valentegppbet, a polyglot performer who sang in more than a dozen languages and who was a television mainstay on two continents in the 1950s and ’60s, died on Sept. 9 at her home in Lugano, Switzerland. She was 93.

Her death was announced on her website.

Ms. Valente achieved stardom in mid-1950s Germany in a popular music genre known as schlager: novelty songs, with titles like “Ganz Paris Träumt von der Liebe” (“All Paris Dreams of Love”) and “Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Honolulu Strandbikini.” By 1955, her hits had put her on the cover of the German newsmagazine Der Spiegel.

Image“Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Honolulu Strandbikini” was one of the first of Ms. Valente’s many hit records.Credit...Decca

Ms. Valente had her own television show in Germany in 1957, and she appeared regularly at the Olympia music hall in Paris throughout her career. Her fluid, confident delivery and sure pitch, as well as her skill as both a guitar player and a tap dancer, carried her across the Atlantic, and by the early 1960s she was a regular on American television.

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Ms. Valente capitalized on her cosmopolitan origins. She was born in Paris to Italian parents, who themselves were entertainers, and brought up in wartime Germany. Fluent in a half-dozen languages, she went on to make records for the French, Italian and German markets, which led to hits all across the continent. She won France’s Grand Prix du Disque for her 1959 recording of the song “Bim-Bom-Bey.”

ImageMs. Valente on a 1966 episode of “The Dean Martin Show.” She was a regular on this and other American variety shows for many years.Credit...NBC, via Everett Collection

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