Mendes collaborated with many artists, including Black Eyed Peas, with whom he re-recorded in 2006 a remake of his 1966 version of the song "Mas que nada", which was a breakthrough hit for him.

As his interest in jazz grew, he started playing in nightclubs in the late 1950s at the time that bossa nova, a jazz-infused derivative of samba, was emerging.

Sergio Mendes played with Antônio Carlos Jobim, who was regarded as a mentor, and U.S. jazz musicians who toured Brazil.

[1] Mendes formed a partnership with Richard Adler, a Brooklyn-born American who had brought Bossa Trés and two dancers, Joe Bennett and a Brazilian partner, to appear on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1963.

He was accompanied by Jobim, Flavio Ramos and Aloísio de Oliveira, a record and TV producer from Rio who had been a member of Carmen Miranda's backing group Bando da Lua.

Alpert took over as producer for the A&M albums and the group became a huge success with their first single, "Mas que nada", by writer Jorge Ben.

The original lineup of Brasil '66 was Mendes (piano), vocalists Lani Hall (later Alpert's wife) and Sylvia Dulce Kleiner (Bibi Vogel [pt; it]) (1942–2004), Bob Matthews (1935–2022) (bass), José Soares (percussion) and João Palma (1943–2016) (drums).

Veteran drummer Dom Um Romão teamed with Rubens Bassini to assume percussionist duties.

Though his early singles with Brasil '66, most notably "Mas que nada", met with some success, Mendes burst into mainstream prominence when he performed the Oscar-nominated "The Look of Love" on the Academy Awards telecast in April 1968.

[1][failed verification] From 1968 on, Mendes was a major Brazilian star[3] and enjoyed immense popularity worldwide, performing in venues as varied as stadium arenas and the White House, where he gave concerts for presidents Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard Nixon.

On his two albums with Bell Records in 1973 and 1974 and several for Elektra from 1975 such as "Brasil '88", Mendes continued to mine the best in American pop music and post-bossa writers of his native Brazil, while forging new directions in soul with collaborators like Stevie Wonder, who wrote Mendes' R&B-inflected minor hit "The Real Thing".

"Never Gonna Let You Go", featuring vocals by Joe Pizzulo and Leeza Miller,[1] equalled the success of his 1968 single "The Look of Love" by reaching No.

By the time Mendes released his Grammy-winning Elektra album Brasileiro in 1992, he was the undisputed master of pop-inflected Brazilian jazz.

[citation needed] The late-1990s lounge music revival brought retrospection and respect to Mendes' oeuvre, particularly the classic Brasil '66 albums.

The 2006 album Timeless featured a wide array of neo-soul and alternative hip hop guest artists, including the Black Eyed Peas, Erykah Badu, Black Thought, Jill Scott, Chali 2na of Jurassic 5, India.Arie, John Legend, Justin Timberlake, Q-Tip, Stevie Wonder and Pharoahe Monch.