Posted on 07/01/2009 3:33:55 PM PDT by Shermy
Fayette Pinkney, an original member of the Three Degrees who lent her strong, soulful voice to the 1970s hits “When Will I See You Again?” and “T.S.O.P. (The Sound of Philadelphia),” the theme song of the television show “Soul Train,” died Saturday in Lansdale, Pa. She was 61.
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For more than a decade, Ms. Pinkney was the one constant in a group whose members came and went. She sang on the group’s first single, “Gee Baby (I’m Sorry),” on its 1970 hit “Maybe” and on the hits for Philadelphia International Records in the 1970s that helped the define the Philadelphia sound.
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The group’s first two singles for Philadelphia International, “Dirty Ol’ Man” and “I Didn’t Know,” were modest successes, but “T.S.O.P.,” a mostly instrumental piece featuring the studio band MFSB, reached No. 1 on both the R&B and pop charts in 1974. “When Will I See You Again?,” which sold more than two million records, reached No. 2 on the pop charts that year.
Their close-harmony singing made the Three Degrees a popular nightclub act. The group performed with Engelbert Humperdinck at the Riviera Hotel in Las Vegas; a performance at the Copacabana in Manhattan ended up in the 1975 film “The French Connection.”
After leaving the Three Degrees and recording a solo album, “One Degree,” in 1979, Ms. Pinkney studied psychology at Temple University and earned a master’s in human services at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania in 1985. She began working as an administrative assistant for the Medical College of Pennsylvania and rose to become an education coordinator there. She later counseled incoming patients at United Behavioral Health in Philadelphia.
She is survived by a brother, Nathaniel.
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(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
But I know this song still is big
Even this white boy thought they were hot back in the day.
Definitely hot.
Thanks for the link, I never knew what she looked like, but she’s as beautiful as I imagined.
That song bings back great memories.
RIP Fayette Pinkney
When Will I See You Again is one of my favorite songs to sing... i played it again and again last summer as we prepared to have our 70s party... which was a blast...
“a soul singer and smart to boot cuz she had three degrees”
g1!
People interested should go to the link...to get the joke.
I had to cut the story to 300 words per editing rules.
i wonder if she is related to illustrator Jerry Pinkney... my kids love him...
Nobody gets outta here alive....rapid rate of checkouts for the famous lately.
” Even this white boy thought they were hot back in the day. “
That makes two of us . Still miss the Afros !
And don’t get me started on Marilyn McCoo....I used to watch “Solid Gold” just to see her.
RIP. Can we have a moratorium on celebrity deaths already ? My head is spinning from the past week alone.
The one in the middle is especially cute.
-PJ
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