Her art speaks for itself; it doesn’t need interpretation or commentary. She is one of a very few stylists without whom you can’t imagine your life being the same.
11
It seems as if she would be here for another twenty years, but that was not to be.
Still, she had been a star for more than fifty years, and her gift was a gift to the world.
There will be a twinge of sadness now when I listen to her recordings.
2
Well said, Dr. Dyson. Well written. With this writing, I know a side of Aretha I didn't know before. I'm loving all these tributes to Aretha - from CNN to Facebook. She was a brilliant, articulate woman and I fully respect her desire for privacy. Her children weren't splashed across the pages of the newspaper. Her business was her business. So thank you for giving us a peep into the Aretha you knew.
8
I remember when Aretha stepped in for Pavoriti when he too sick. She sang opera and was as amazing as she was singing everything else, she indeed trapped lightning in her mouth!
3
Let's please remember that she was a fine singer, but not the researcher who cured cancer or developed a new and useful vaccine or invention. Put things in perspective and remember in your praise Jonas Salk, too. Oh, who was he?
1
@Nreb
Dear Nreb,
Too bad she did not inspire you. But most of the people posting here were inspired. Why are you so upset about that? It diminishes no one's accomplishments (Jonas Salk's for instance) to delight in the accomplishments of others as well.
If her singing doesn't raise the hair on the back of your neck, then fine, but for me and many others her voice resonated in our souls. The day it doesn't move me I will know rigor mortis has set in.
Ciao for now.
14
@Nreb:
Yes, perspective is important.
"I know that the most joy in my life has come to me from my violin."
~Albert Einstein
9
An angel returns home
5
Testify, Dr. Dyson!
Nothing to add but Amen.
3
OK, ENOUGH! I had to turn off NPR this morning due to this fellow's ranting. Plenty of us pay no attention to CHURCH!
1
@Nreb:
Hmm. You "had" to turn off NPR . . . and then you had to read (one presumes) Dr. Dyson's op-ed here and comment on it.
You may be paying more attention than you think.
11
I only had to hear Respect one time, when I was about 8, to become a lifelong fan. That kind of honesty and power is a rare thing in life. She had it in spades. RIP Queen of Soul.
7
I didn't grow up in Detroit or have the pleasure of knowing both Ms. Franklin or her revered father in person -- and yes, I must admit as to having a bit of envy for those who can trace their Southern roots back to the diaspora of the African-American history that has provided so much 'soul' to our shared experience.
This is why I must thank Mr. Dyson for sharing his fond memories about that history, and of someone who touched so many of us in a special way.
Rest in Peace, Ms. Aretha Franklin.
The heavens must be rejoicing to finally have you back home.
12
What great thoughts and memories of Aretha that everyone has contributed!
I was fortunate to see her perform one time, the Newport Folk Festival about 10 years ago. We were anchored on our boat rafted together with 10 other boats, among the hundreds of other boats in the harbor watching Aretha. She played about 5 or 6 numbers on her piano before going stand-up at the microphone. What a great lady!
I have read so many accounts of Aretha in the Times and elsewhere which are priceless. I do have one memory I wish to share. Years ago, I can't remember exactly, Aretha was on television on a cooking show with the host chef. She was cooking her favorite dishes, and at the same time giving a commentary of her career and life at that point. Aretha was absolutely precious, and very funny with her recollections and descriptions of the people she knew and performed with. She almost blushed, I recall, when talking about Sam Cooke!
Anyway, I always remember the warmth and real person that Aretha displayed on that cooking show!
8
@Bill Murray
Dear Bill,
I remember seeing that show, I believe it was Emeril Lagasse. She was kind and gracious and you could tell there was no pretense in her manner.
The hair on the back of my neck still stands up when I hear her rip into the chorus and blasting out FREEDOM, FREEDOM, FREEDOM.
Something was very powerful there besides just her voice. Remarkable person.
12
@gpickard
So it was Emeril? I truly forgot who the host chef was, but you learned how genuine Arethra was by watching her in the kitchen. After these many years, I still strongly remember her appearance on the cooking show that really showed her true nature which translated to the stage!
1
Villegas Conclusion:
It's about feeling strength and power and justice on your side when you have a heartache. Do you know that when you are hurt you gather in every ounce of strength you have and are the most powerful you have ever been? That is what Aretha Franklin tells me every time I hear her voice.
I don't even know what else to say. But we have to fight to keep the legacy of Motown, the renaissance that built Detroit and built America in the light. They would have you forget it. They would have you forget Aretha Franklin and remember the names of neighborhoods rebranded and given away. We have to always draw the connections to the sound of our hustle and the ladder that some can walk all the way up to sing about , because it will always be power that we own that heals the most broken of us. Thankyou for being immortal but also for being so mortal. Thankyou Aretha.
12
@Thomas Pedroni Very well said. Last night, when Smokey Robinson was talking about Aretha, who he's known since he was 8 and was his oldest surviving friend, he mentioned that Diana Ross had lived a few doors down from him and The Four Tops lived a few blocks away and The Temptations a few streets away. He said there were many more singers who just didn't get a break.
Was it something in the water? How did so many musical geniuses who changed American music all happen to live so close by and come up at the same time?
I've always been fascinated by Detroit. It's history is amazing. It broke my heart to see its fall and I rejoice in its rise. But I worry that what makes Detroit special will be swept away by gentrification. It's happening in Harlem.
When things were really bad in Detroit and you could get property for next to nothing, I dreamed of buying something. I know I'm African-Canadian but I thought that my respect for Detroit's history (and the fact that Black people don't scare me so much, I want to force them out of their own neighbourhoods once I move in) would mitigate my foreign-ness.
Hopefully, the passing of a born and bred daughter of Detroit who NEVER left will re-awaken that Motown spirit (even though Berry Gordy never signed Aretha!).
4
I was at the end of my freshman year in 1967 when WOL in Washington, D.C., one of the city’s two black radio stations, rolled out “Respect.” The dee-jay didn’t tell us anything but the title. I briefly wondered why he was trotting out the Otis Redding tune from 1966 when the opening guitar solo intertwined with the saxophone intro. I breathed a version of “what the (hell)?” and then came the timeless “Whatchoo want; baby I got it. Whatchoo need; baby I got it.” The Howard University campus wasn’t the same.
As I (and a thousand other guys) ogled the sisters on the campus, I noticed that something had changed. And it wasn’t the guys. The ladies were through with the jive. The girl I was sparking told me one night, out of the clear blue, “I want respect.” What was I missing? “Don’t I give you the respect that our relationship demands?” I asked her. Her answer was troubling; “No, not really. Not the kind I want or need.”
Thoroughly baffled and beating an emotional retreat, I asked her where and how I had failed. She said, “I, like a lot of other girls, just got freed.” In a prescient read of the future track title to “It’s A Different World” from the Bill Cosby spin-off, sung by the Queen of Soul, the tectonic plates between young black men and young black women were undergoing a profound shift. “Oh,” she said in a rush, “it’s just that...” She never finished the sentence.
There was no going back.
72
@Soxared, '04, '07, '13
Always like your writing. But this wins the internet, their should be a prize and award ceremony.
5
Since early this week when we all heard that an African American performer named Omarosa of many faces was called “that dog” by Trump just as we ALSO heard that one of the greatest women of all time Lady Sould herself Aretha Franklin lay dying at home and roundly revered with R-E-S-P-E-C-T, I cannot help but think Trump has reached the lowest of the low and we should all join in unyielding rejection of any man, any person, least of all a President calling any person, a woman, a black woman That DOG. Done.
8
I like this piece but just a little historical perspective .. when she signed to Columbia, John Hammond, while being an extremely talented producer, had her doing Jazz, light Blues, and Pop. And of course with such a voice and sense of timing, she made the best of it. But those early albums on Columbia, while being collectors items, are just not that good. It's only when she signed with Atlantic and Jerry Wexler saw her as a powerful Soul & Funk singer. He put the Muscle Shoals boys (& Duane Allman on some material) with her and she really soared. Yes she let it loose .........
4
Don't forget the genius of Tom Dowd, sound engineer extraordinaire at Atlantic Records. Bringing it all together. He was phenomenal.
3
Even this lifelong atheist knows that when Aretha sang, what she delivered was holy.
18
Villegas Part 3 of 3, plus conclusion:
Celebrities fall from grace but she was not a pretty face who stopped making blockbuster movies, she was a woman with a godlike talent living amongst us and she always got scrutiny. Do you know why? Because she had something that you could not buy. She had something she was born with that nobody else could have. It would not matter where you were born, who you were, what you had at your disposal, you could not bend the will of fate to give you the talent that this woman was born with in our city, where she still lived, packed garage and all.
I did an experiment. When it seemed like motown
evaporated from the airwaves and I was in charge of the front desk at work not long ago in a place providing utility assistance. I would always put on motown. And people who were walking in the office for assistance with some of the most severe and heartbreaking crisis that you could ever imagine would light up. People with nothing and nobody. Chain of Fools. Chain of Fools was on and the entire room sang out. Someone delivering mail started a line of dancing.
I feel so sad today knowing that Aretha is gone. But she lived among us. She raised up many broken hearts because you can be so hurt. You can be in so much pain. The kind of pain where you want to cry out and then Aretha sings the words of your pain and she cries out for you and you know that pain isn't about weakness.
(Conclusion follows)
15
Villegas Part 1 of 3
Dr. Dyson, such beautiful words. I want to offer you in return the moving words of another younger (and this is important) Detroiter, Zoe Villegas, who captures so poetically what Aretha Franklin signifies, perhaps more importantly now than ever, for Detroit.
Zoë Villegas writes:
Do you remember when we were little and the city was so different and the most legendary people were in our reach? Rosa Parks lived across from school. Stevie Wonder was always somewhere shaking someone's hand. Always stopping in music shops playing keyboards and making friends. Michael Jackson made the trip in with Tommy Hearns to endorse the casino and in that window of time everyone managed to see him somewhere. We did a tribute to Motown in school. I was a Marvellette. It didn't matter I wasn't Black. Motown was everything. It was the foundation of every single thing, this history which was still happening these mythical characters who would come out of the shadows in certain moments, seen picking up carry out orders or at a graduation. Like Oz from behind the curtain. And we really were on that yellow brick road in that kingdom.
(Continued)
10
Villegas Part 2 of 3
Villegas continues:
I remember going over the words to "the Locomotion" and watching footage of the assembly line in school. Music was connected to working life our parents, grandparents, cousins came from. There was a heavenly sort of transaction. You could be an ambassador for the working people singing the songs on the radio to be danced to on nights off, the assembly line could give you the material. We would pay for the glitter. It was so instilled in our identity, that it was literally our curriculum. And I can say that as a Detroiter, you earn not what I would call confidence but a trust in any gift that you carry. Because we saw who came before. It is a path. We saw Aretha Franklin.
And it was what was on the radio always. It could subdue any rowdy group with "what becomes of the broken hearted" or make any subdued crowd dance to "Heatwave". Every song, within the first two beats you knew. Marvellettes, Supremes, the Miracles, Aretha....
Aretha. The most legendary of any voice in any genre. The most recognizable sound anyone would ever hear. And she was from where we were from. And lets be real. Do you remember the hate she got?
Aretha on the news for hoarding. Aretha mentioned on the news for her "diva-esque" attitude. Aretha was disrespected. There was a real resentment of her gift that I saw perpetuated on Detroit's media and as a child I remember noting it.
(Continued)
5
Mr. Person I, I know exactly what you mean. Growing up outside of Philadelphia, my siblings & I listened to Motown & Atlantic Singers all the time. We (mostly me) would hear the first two notes of any song & knew what song it was. If I liked the song, I'd run up to the radio and sing along, so much so I knew every nuance. "Since You Been Gone" by Ms. Franklin was one of those songs. The arrangement is sublime. I still sing along when I hear it. My all-time favorite of Aretha's. She was something else. R.I.P., Lady Soul & thank you for sharing your gifts with the world.
6
Sorry, I meant Pedroni. Auto- correct is so annoying.....
Amen brother.
6
Awesome amen! Aretha changed my life. Thanks for this intimate tribute.
4
Gasp. The encomium is beautiful withal, but it would have been worth publishing for that first paragraph alone. Thank you for the inspiration.
3
Amen! Thrilled to see Ms. Franklin's faith acknowledged and celebrated as the foundation for her amazing life's work.
4
In homage to the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin, I wish to say that to me her life exemplified 'The Spirit in the Dark' she was one who spent a lifetime reminding each of us that we are all of us Sinner's seeking the light of God, and his Son Jesus Christ. This could not have been an easy task as she undoubtedly kept one foot in the Church, and the other in the World in order to lift us up out of our mire through her music. Like her Father before her, she embraced all in her environment who were shunned by those established in society. This is the lesson Jesus taught us with regards to the Pharisees, as they remarked 'This man dines with sinners'. Every since my early youth in Detroit, I have encountered countless numbers of such sinful people, and I have learned despite this fact, that good people never the less abound, and continue to rise up. We can never know how many people Aretha saved through her Gospel, assuredly it has been many. Long Live The Queen !
5
Thank you for that wonderful remembrance!
2
I have vacillated all over the religious charts, from a positive baptist to full born atheist but I knew before "Respect" that I loved Aretha as she had something that no other had.
I have just watched her deliver 'You Make Me Feel Like "A Natural Woman"" here on NYTimes from YouTube with the Obamas and the writer of the song in the audience, that is not a movie watching for old timers like me, that is a lifetime experience, Thank You, NYTimes.
My soul cries as it is in mourning over the death of my Queen.
4
Thank you, Dr. Dyson.
She sang my heart and strutted through my soul. I love her dearly.
8
Everything about her is blended into one word: talent. A gift she used with her fingers on the piano keyboard and her commanding voice. Aretha will forever be the vital link between the black gospel tradition and the truest of American music forms, blues, jazz and rock. Every song is loaded with power, waiting to radiate and bring joy to any listener, anywhere.
8
Thank you for revealing these beautiful layers of Ms. Franklin's life. All the more grateful for her presence here among us and her generous spirit. May she rest in peace!
3
Thank you for this beautiful look at a remarkable woman. As a Motown baby, born in 1960 in Detroit, I grew up with her strong anthems and believed in them as gospel. Hers was the voice of my youth coming through my little transistor radio from station CKLW. She could make that radio buzz! Only seven when Respect hit the charts, it continued to surround me in my formative years. I feel fortunate to have grown up with Aretha's music as my soundtrack and proud that such a magnificent talent was also part of my hometown.
9
Thank you for this beautiful love letter to an amazing woman who uplifted the world with her voice.
16
Such beautiful and poignant words my dear preacher. As an old friend of her brother Cecil and a fellow Detroit, thank you for placing your thoughts and my own, in the proper prospective for this sad time!
God Bless!
7
Aretha, may she rest in peace, arose during the golden era of Black radio stations. During high school in the early '60s I listened to WAMO in Pittsburgh. When I moved to L.A. in '64, there was a similar station. I forget the call letter. These stations, with their brilliant disc jokeys, constituted an underground political medium hiding in plain sight. An early catalyst for the budding white counterculture as well.
4
I remember my late husband & I watching President Obama’s first inauguration. As soon as Aretha’s face appeared on the TV, we both said at the same time “Church Hat!” I also remember writing Ellen D., a slightly negative letter after she made fun of that hat on her show!
20
My mom sang in the choir with Aretha Franklin at New Bethel in Detroit as teens. Growing up in Detroit myself during the 60's and 70's, it was somewhat commonplace to see Aretha Franklin in Detroit, along with other recording star such as Stevie Wonder, the Temptations, Berry Gordy, you name them and we always saw them. The music industry and the " Motor City" has lost a "Singing Legend" and will definitely be missed.
14
https://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/25/opinion/25herbert.html?rref=collectio...
When Aretha Franklin became ill, almost eight years ago, Bob Herbert wrote a beautiful column about Aretha's own life and her influence in his. The link is attached above. It's really touching, and reading his wishes for her feels bittersweet now.
4
@NM, NY: Daughter of the esteemed, renowned Cairene scholar. I just read the Bob Herbert piece. That 7 1/2-year old column was correct in all its dynamics including, unfortunately, the manner of Aretha's going from this world to the next.
After finishing it I then immediately looked for the Comments icon. I was interested to see if there were folks from that day who might have weighed in on Ms. Franklin's precarious situation. On the one hand, we had her with us for just short of eight years. On the other, we'll never know how difficult it must have been for the Queen to live through the torments that showed her out of one day and into the next. What her family and greatest friends endured I can't begin to imagine. Perhaps the icon wasn't open then because if it had been, your tribute to Ms. Franklin would, doubtless, been as soaring as the notes that she easily climbed above, leaving mere mortals with the impossible task of duplicating them.
I was also struck, yesterday, by the many items in the Times about the Queen. Once upon a time, an obit in a "big city" paper (translation: place where a lot of black people live) would have sufficed for the death of a black artist. Even my own hometown Boston Globe waxed poetic in their remembrances of her.
R-E-S-P-E-C-T. She gave it to us and we returned it--in spades, if you will. Respect is a commodity in short supply in our present-day America. If we had it once, we sure don't now. But we had Aretha; we'll always have Aretha.
7
Thank you for posting this 2010 Bob Herbert piece. And, yes, as Mr. Herbert suggests, a toast and a prayer for Queen Aretha are certainly due.
4
Exqusite piece! Thanks for sharing
1
Villegas Conclusion:
It's about feeling strength and power and justice on your side when you have a heartache. Do you know that when you are hurt you gather in every ounce of strength you have and are the most powerful you have ever been? That is what Aretha Franklin tells me every time I hear her voice.
I don't even know what else to say. But we have to fight to keep the legacy of Motown, the renaissance that built Detroit and built America in the light. They would have you forget it. They would have you forget Aretha Franklin and remember the names of neighborhoods rebranded and given away. We have to always draw the connections to the sound of our hustle and the ladder that some can walk all the way up to sing about , because it will always be power that we own that heals the most broken of us. Thankyou for being immortal but also for being so mortal. Thankyou Aretha.
9
Thank you for a lovely tribute to The Queen. She transcended every genre and remained true to her self, art, and voice.
10
I was only 10 y/o in 1967, but I remember they were turbulent times. I was fortunate to be one of 6 children, including a twin sister, and an older sister who loved R+B music. My twin and I used to light candles when our parents were out, and listen to Aretha with the lights turned off. We would watch the dancing shadows that our bodies cast on the candlelit walls...young, nubile budding, prepubescent girls, just want to have fun!
My first official big date was a concert to see Aretha and Ray Charles in New York. I was 15. I saw her again at the Apollo theatre at 17, and just about 5 years ago in a small venue. Wow! She could still rock the house, just like it was 1967.
Aretha’s music transcended race and time. She spoke to ALL WOMEN, and to our deep longing to LOVE, to BE LOVED, to be TAKEN SERIOUSLY and RESPECTED.
22
What a poetic tribute to Aretha.
15
The planet has lost an original human being with the voice of exquisite beauty and tremendous power.
The planet weeps.
20
Here's a fun memory of Aretha:
her singing "Think" (and dancing/acting) in John Landis' movie "The Blues Brothers" in 1980. What a performance!
30
@JediProf
Wonderful! and weren't those her sisters behind her?
1
In his appraisal of Aretha Franklin, Micheal Aric Dyson comes to the conclusion that skeptics of Franklin's switch from sacred to secular music were mistaken in their belief that it was a betrayal.
He was right.
Franklin's switch of music styles allowed her to find her true identity. She grew up with the sacred, church music because her father was a pastor. Seemingly, all she knew, since she was young, was the sacred style of music. The switch let her explore the vast world of music and find her true, soulful, and powerful self.
As her death is mourned, it is important to realize what a true feminist, social activist, vocal powerhouse, and soulful queen Franklin turned out to be. Without her switch of music styles early in her life, it's interesting to wonder if Aretha Franklin would have become the same, outstanding woman without it.
17
Aretha’s gospel background laid the groundwork for her soul reaching voice. She sang to us through troubled historical times and she sang to us in better times ... I loved this woman’s voice ! You will be missed dear Aretha Franklin ... you worked to make us feel and do better to one another.
13
When I think of Blues Singers the first one that comes to mind in Bessie Smith, it is too bad most people today have never heard any of her recordings, melodious, rhythmic did not have to scream her high notes.
Franklin certainly caught the emotion as do her fans, she was a great performer and had the advantage of modern media for exposure.
Even sop, I say listen to the recordings of Smith, Ma Rainey, Mildred Baily, Billie Holliday, Big Mama Thornton for comparison. They were the pioneers and should not be forgotten in the wake of all the accolades for Franklin.
5
Aretha's singing embodied the qualities of Bessie Smith, Billie Holliday, Ma Rainey and other under appreciated, (sadly out of style ) pioneers, like Sister Rosetta Thorpe.
9
Thank you for your well written piece. I grew up North of Milwaukee. Listening to her sing lifts me up. So happy she was in my life. A gift
The Lord will take her in to heaven with a smile on his face.
17
Speaking as an atheist, I have to say that the essential Aretha Franklin performance was her 1972 live-in-LA gospel album, Amazing Grace.
That's where I've always found most, our spirit, our doubts, our hard earned respect. The song of America that Barack Obama noted in his tribute to Ms. Franklin this morning.
Marianne Faithfull was right, Aretha Franklin was the voice of god. Amazing grace, indeed.
47
@William Verick
Amen.
Ms. Franklin, is/was, one of a kind. Her gifts were her heart and her voice wrapped in her SOUL. Her, Heart of Hearts, entered each moment that was shared with her global family. Each, word, held a message from her soulful heart filled with the Spirit of All That Is. Mahalo and Aloha, Ms Franklin as you go forth in another adventure in Spirit World as you continue to watch over us and assist us as we go forth on Grandmother Earth. Blessings Eternally
9
Nice reflections...my favorite obit, so far. Thanks for your thoughtful writing that helps to explain something, you can't quite put into everyday words.
17
Mr. Dyson, I grew up in a very white small-town 60s Michigan, but Ms. Franklin's influence was profound there too. How could anyone believe, I thought, in the canard of white racial superiority when such a transcendent black artist was singing to us everyday? I was persuaded by the arguments, intellect, and humanity of King, Malcolm, Baldwin, et. al., that racism was an illness from which America had to recover. But Aretha melted my heart before my head could catch up.
46
How can one sum up a life's work that slipped seamlessly through color, genders, religions and music genres? I have absolutely no idea at all.
Alas tears.
26
Gratitude to MED for this sharing this with us, from another atheist who believes in Aretha Franklin.
“You’re the key to my peace of mind” slays me every time.
28
Amen. Aretha Franklin knew, like her friends Otis Redding and Van Morrison knew, that in the end the darkness will not prevail, as long as hope, beauty and love gain breath. Amen, dear sister!
22
Aretha was great, but I prefer Mavis Staples. Aesthetically speaking, there was something strident in Aretha's voice which did not flow and resonate like Mavis. Nevertheless, Aretha proves that you have to be black, and have the pain and suffering of centuries of abuse, to get that timbre in your voice. Someday people are going to finally figure out that the color of one's skin has nothing to do with character or the quality of the person. After we get rid of the current president it might be possible. Unfortunately hostility towards people with darker skin seems to be an age-old prejudice in many countries- which is ironic because EVERYBODY CAME OUT OF AFRICA! Wake up everybody!
4
Aretha Franklin was like a righeous thunderstorm. She blazed like lightening and scorched our complacent souls. And then rain. I still get a chill up and down my spine when I hear her spell out R E S P E C T. RIP I am sure the Lord has already welcomed her to glory.
46
@gpickard What a profound and true description of the power of her talent. Thank you.
8
As the Motown sound dominated the R&B/soul markets and attracted crossover music fans, Aretha Franklin experimented with other genres until she found her own voice, her own niche. She knew she had a gift, and after a few false starts, she hit her stride and never looked back. Like Sam Cooke before her, Aretha’s secular career was frowned upon by the gospel community but she marched to the beat of her own drummer. Aretha Franklin was an amazing singer and the hundreds of tributes to her genius will never do her justice. She’s singing for God now.
27
Aretha Franklin was the first woman inducted into the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame. Her music encompassed a broad spectrum. She didn't allow herself to be pigeonholed into any singular style or sound. And Aretha poured so much of herself into her music that it all presented authentically. So few people could do that and appeal that broadly - a gift from Heaven to Earth!
5
@NM -- dear friend, you should be writing for Rolling Stone, Variety or Billboard. With your knowledge and excellent writing, you're giving Mr. Dyson a run for his money. Great post here!!
I grew up on the east side of Detroit. Aretha's voice was who encouraged me to line dance, showing me the freedom of movement. It was her gospel songs that brought me to gospel churches. where I learned how spirit moved through music bringing a people to a higher place. This despite I was a skinny blonde child who walked in alone, I never walked out without many joyful hugs. I played "Respect" every morning to remind me that I too could grow into a proud woman who deserved goodness. She is the queen of my heart as well as the queen of soul.
The world was richer for her skill, talent and perseverance. May she fly free, reaching ever higher notes.
33
Aretha Franklin could sing the phone book (archaic reference) and transport me to be a better place.
For me, her voice is an invocation - it makes any space it fills more true.
I hope she had some sense of her extraordinary gift and her instinctive ability to distinguish the human soul.
She'll be missed, but I among many will continue to fill days and nights with the unmistakable magic of her sweet, sweet healing sound.
I am truly thankful for Aretha Franklin.
38
Not so archaic. I use the phrase often, when describing the sublime. Well done!
Thank you Dr. Dyson, for articulating what many of us are not able to put into words. I was brought up on the old left and so my experience of gospel came from the songs we sang on the longing for freedom. When I heard the gospel sound on which many of these songs were based, I was transfixed. I just could not get enough of that sound. Aretha blended the longing of the soul for freedom with the longing of the body for love and in that way gave us a form of worship we sorely needed: even the Jewish atheists of the old left. Rest in peace, Aretha.
25
Dr. Dyson, thank you. I’m a long time atheist. But, when I have the rare glimmers of WANTING to believe, it’s powerful. Those occasions usually involve just the act of really listening to an incredible singer, one that transports me to another place, another time, even another reality. Her talent was otherworldly, incomparable, and everlasting. If any humans are on this planet in a thousand years, or ten thousand, I know WHO they will be listening to. We are all honored, to have heard HER.
55
@Phyliss Dalmatian
Also ELVIS. They will be listening to both.
Seriously.
3