Legendary singer Miriam Makeba, affectionately known as Mama Africa, died of a heart attack in Italy shortly after a concert performance, a report said on Monday.

The South African singer died overnight aged 76 after being admitted to hospital near the southern Italian town of Caserta, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP), quoting the Italian ANSA news agency.

Mama Africa was known for her songs about Africa's struggles for independence.

"People gave me that name. At first I said to myself: 'Why do they want to give me that responsibility, carrying a whole continent?' Then I understood that they did that affectionately. So I accepted. I am Mama Africa," she told AFP in an interview in 2005.

Makeba, whose most famous hits included Pata Pata, The Click Song (Qongqothwane in Xhosa) and Mailaka, died after taking part in a concert for Roberto Saviano, a writer threatened with death by the Mafia, the Italian agency said.

She sang for half an hour for the author of "Gomorrah" at Castel Volturno near Naples alongside other singers and artists.

ANSA said Makeba started feeling ill and was taken to a clinic in Castel Volturno where she died of a heart attack.

Associated Press reported that the emergency room of the Pineta Grande Clinic, a private facility in Castel Volturno, confirmed reports of her death.

Miriam Zenzi Makeba was born in Johannesburg on March 4, 1932. According to Wikipedia, her mother was a Swazi sangoma and her father, who died when she was six, was a Xhosa.

As a child, she attended a training institute in Pretoria for eight years where she first started singing.

Her professional career kicked off in the 1950s with the Manhattan Brothers, before she formed her own group, The Skylarks.

She grabbed international attention in 1959 when she starred in the anti-apartheid documentary Come Back, Africa.

After that, she went to London where she met Harry Belafonte. He helped her get entry to the United States, where she released many of her famous songs.

She received a Grammy Award for Best Folk Recording in 1966 with Harry Belafonte for An Evening With Belafonte/Makeba.

The album was about black South Africans living under apartheid.

When she tried to return to South Africa, she discovered that her passport had been revoked.

She testified against apartheid before the United Nations in 1963.

She was married to singer Hugh Masekela and Trinidadian civil rights activist and Black Panthers leader Stokely Carmichael.

When her only daughter, Bongi Makeba, died in 1985, she moved to Brussels.

Anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela persuaded her to return to South Africa in 1990.

She was always optimistic about post-apartheid South Africa, even though she acknowledged that it came with its own problems.

"We have only had 11 years of democracy but we are moving, we are moving forward faster than many countries who have been independent a long, long time before. We all have to do it together, all of us, found ourselves this country regardless we are black, white or whatever," she said in the interview with AFP.

Asked who the next Makeba would be, she replied: "No, nobody can replace me as I can't replace anyone else," said the singer, who added that she wanted to leave a memory of, simply, a "very good old lady".