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Roberta Flack, singer of 'Killing Me Softly,' has died at age 88
NPR ^ | February 24, 2025 | Marissa Lorusso , Elizabeth Blair

Posted on 02/24/2025 9:43:57 AM PST by Red Badger

Singer Roberta Flack, who broke through as one of the most important and beloved singers of the 1970s and beyond with a sound that combined soul, jazz, rock and pop, died Monday at the age of 88.

A representative for Flack did not share a cause of death, but the singer had been battling amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS.

Musically gifted from a young age, Flack won a scholarship to Howard University at just 15 with plans to pursue a classical music career.

Turning The Tables Remembering Roberta Flack: The Virtuoso "My real ambition was to be a concert pianist," Flack told NPR in 2012, "and to play Schumann and Bach and Chopin - the romantics. Those were my guys."

But her teachers discouraged her from trying to break into the mostly white world of classical music in the late 1950s. Upon graduating, Flack taught at schools in North Carolina and Washington, D.C., and began performing in clubs, both as a pianist for other vocalists and as a singer herself. Attention from fellow musicians led to a contract with Atlantic Records, who released her debut album, First Take, in 1969.

First Take sold well but Flack credited her 1970 appearance guest-starring on The Third Bill Cosby Special with "the biggest break of my career," as she told The New York Times. When Clint Eastwood used her version of Ewan MacColl's "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" in his 1971 movie Play Misty For Me, Flack's popularity soared.

The string of albums that followed — Chapter Two, Quiet Fire, Killing Me Softly, Feel Like Makin' Love and an album of duets with Donny Hathaway — made her one of the decade's most popular singers. In 1971, DownBeat Magazine named her the year's best female vocalist, breaking Ella Fitzgerald's 18-year streak. She earned eight Grammy nominations and four wins during this period, and remains the only solo artist to win the Grammy for record of the year two years in a row: in 1973, for "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face," and in 1974, for "Killing Me Softly With His Song."

Flack's superstardom didn't always translate to critical praise. NPR's Ann Powers points out that she was winning over audiences at a time when songwriters were getting most of the attention. "The idea that you had to write your own material was was held up as the gold standard," says Powers. "For much longer interpreters were the greats, and Roberta Flack stands with Sinatra, with Ella Fitzgerald, with so many great interpreters of the 20th century, as someone who made every song she approached original."

In the mid-'70s, Flack's pace in the studio slowed slightly as she scored for film and TV, worked in music publishing and record producing and engaged in graduate-level coursework in education and linguistics. She returned with Blue Lights in the Basement in 1977, and continued releasing albums from the late '70s through the early '00s, including another album featuring Hathaway, a duet album with Peabo Bryson and a Christmas album. Flack continued performing around the world, though she suffered some health setbacks in the 2010s.

In 2022, Flack announced that she had ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), popularly known as Lou Gehrig's disease. The following year, she came out with The Green Piano: How Little Me Found Music, a children's book about the time her father restored an old piano so that little Roberta could practice at home, co-written with Tonya Bolden.

Throughout her career, Flack built a musical legacy by working outside the confines of genre. She was known for helping to shape and define "quiet storm" R&B, and laid the groundwork for the rise of neo-soul. But her celebrated work as an interpreter of songs included elements of rock, folk, jazz, classical, Latin and more, continually challenging racialized conventions about popular music and influencing generations of artists.

"My main interest is in telling my story through a song — whether mine or someone else's," Flack told NPR's Ann Powers in 2020. "Tell the truth with clarity and honesty so that the listener can feel their story."


TOPICS: History; Music/Entertainment; Society; TV/Movies
KEYWORDS: als; elizabethblair; marissalorusso; obit; robertaflack; robertaflackobit
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To: Red Badger
Beautiful lady. Gifted voice. Man that song brings back some memories.

Roberta Flack - Killing Me Softly With His Song (Live 1973)
21 posted on 02/24/2025 12:57:14 PM PST by Tommy Revolts
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To: Tommy Revolts

Though she didn’t write it, it was written about Don McClean (Bye, Bye Miss American Pie) by Charles Fox, Norman Gimbel and Lori Lieberman............

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_Me_Softly_with_His_Song


22 posted on 02/24/2025 1:01:33 PM PST by Red Badger (Homeless veterans camp in the streets while illegals are put up in 5 Star hotels....................)
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To: Red Badger

I read once she wrote it after seeing Elton John in concert.

But I knew she didn’t write it.


23 posted on 02/24/2025 1:12:36 PM PST by Fledermaus (GOP RINOs - Get on Board or Get Out!)
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To: Vermont Lt

So do I. Right now, I’m on Spotify listening to her songs.


“The First Time Ever I saw Your Face” is currently playing. Love that one too.


24 posted on 02/24/2025 1:25:10 PM PST by CrimsonTidegirl (Proud Liverpool fan. Up the Reds! #You’llNeverWalkAlone)
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To: Red Badger

RIP Roberta Flack.


25 posted on 02/24/2025 1:31:09 PM PST by rod5591
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To: dfwgator

She had some great songs with Donny. Always loved his voice...too bad he was nuts.


26 posted on 02/24/2025 1:32:23 PM PST by BookmanTheJanitor
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To: BookmanTheJanitor

Always loved his voice...too bad he was nuts.


He sang the theme song to “Maude”.


27 posted on 02/24/2025 1:35:16 PM PST by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: fidelis
At the top of my list of one of the most beautiful songs of all time........

Our days are fastly counting down.

28 posted on 02/24/2025 1:37:42 PM PST by Hot Tabasco
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To: Luke21

That is my favorite of theirs too. She outlived Donny by 4+ decades


29 posted on 02/24/2025 1:42:17 PM PST by Burma Jones
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To: Hot Tabasco
"Our days are fastly counting down."

Quite true. Everything we knew that touched our lives is slowly fading away, the stars blinking out one by one. One day, we will follow them.

30 posted on 02/24/2025 2:02:52 PM PST by fidelis (👈 Under no obligation to respond to rude, ignorant, abusive, bellicose, and obnoxious posts.)
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To: Red Badger

I can’t add anything else to all of the praise posted here. Thanks Roberta Flack for the memories, and RIP.


31 posted on 02/24/2025 3:14:30 PM PST by TwelveOfTwenty (Prayers for the US and President Trump)
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To: Red Badger

32 posted on 02/24/2025 3:52:26 PM PST by Libloather (Why do climate change hoax deniers live in mansions on the beach?)
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To: Red Badger

I always loved her song “Ballad of the Sad Young Men”.
Give a listen...

https://youtu.be/JksP1Kc6fjo?si=rZtHTZHYKUQeWLEx


33 posted on 02/24/2025 4:59:37 PM PST by Wasichu
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To: Carriage Hill
Indeed, what a soothing, soulful voice.

RIP

34 posted on 02/24/2025 5:06:53 PM PST by RckyRaCoCo (Time to throw them out of the Temple...again)
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To: Red Badger
88 years old.

That was the most shocking part about this.

I'm old enough to remember her when she was still young.

35 posted on 02/24/2025 5:09:02 PM PST by SamAdams76
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To: Red Badger

Such a romantic song. Lovely lady. God bless her friends and loved ones dealing with this loss. Hope she was a true believer and is now resting in glory.


36 posted on 02/25/2025 12:14:29 AM PST by Albion Wilde (“Did you ever meet a woke person that’s happy? There’s no such thing.” —Donald J. Trump)
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To: quilterdebbie

Seemed like a good person..wonderful music..she did well with her life...sad that she got a horrible disease. RIP.


37 posted on 02/25/2025 12:38:10 AM PST by cherry
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To: fidelis

Poetry...well done.


38 posted on 02/25/2025 12:42:21 AM PST by cherry
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To: Red Badger; Pelham

I knew her younger lover in st Ann’s Jamaica and Manhattan. In the 80s
A white Jamaican girl
Not always lesbian like flack was

A lifetime Agom


39 posted on 02/25/2025 12:47:32 AM PST by wardaddy (Joy, can you cook fried chicken?)
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To: Vermont Lt

Sad, her big debut was in a Clint Eastwood movie with Jessica Walter as a romantic interest stalker. “Play Misty for me.”


40 posted on 02/25/2025 1:11:34 AM PST by Gaffer
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