By Anna Daniels
Photo Credit: Alex /Soul Pictures/Flickr
This past week we learned that Aretha Franklin was approaching the end of her life surrounded by friends, family and luminaries. During the ensuing days, images of Aretha and strains of her songs have been shared in the public sphere. Many of us have gone through our own personal play list of the Queen of Soul who died today.
Her hit song “Respect” which was released in 1967 became a rallying cry for so many of us. Aretha’s producer Jerry Wexler described its significance.
‘Respect’ had the biggest impact, truly global in its influence, with overtones for the civil-rights movement and gender equality, Wexler said. It was an appeal for dignity combined with a blatant lubricity. There are songs that are a call to action. There are love songs. There are sex songs. But it’s hard to think of another song where all those elements are combined.
It was followed by an astounding discography over the next decades that we moved our bodies to with the joy of simply being alive or that we let sink into our tired, troubled hearts.
Aretha helped define the American experience. In her voice, we could feel our history, all of it and in every shade—our power and our pain, our darkness and our light, our quest for redemption and our hard-won respect. May the Queen of Soul rest in eternal peace. pic.twitter.com/bfASqKlLc5
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 16, 2018
RIP Aretha Franklin 1942-2018
Someday We’ll All Be Free
Anna Daniels
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The song “You Make Me Feel Like a Natural Woman” which catapulted Aretha in the charts was composed by Carole King, a Jewish American, who doesn’t get enough credit. Without her song writing and others like her, Aretha would never have been able to climb the charts. She deserves at least some of the credit for Aretha’s fame.
Carol has been getting some coverage, at least on MSNBC. There’s a great YouTube video of a segment of All In (with Ali Velshi sitting in for Chris Hayes) where she and the Rev. Al Sharpton reminisce about Aretha and Carol tells in detail the story of how Aretha came to sing her song. There’s also some great footage of the Kennedy Center performance where Aretha starts the program by playing the piece on the piano and Carol King is in the audience responding to Aretha. Its definitely worth a look! :-)