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The Magnificent Linda Ronstadt
National Review ^ | September 5, 2019 | Kyle Smith

Posted on 09/05/2019 9:50:53 PM PDT by ProtectOurFreedom

At her concerts, Linda Ronstadt used to imagine that audience members were whispering to one another about what a terrible singer she was. She was an unusual rock star in several ways. Few others were as careful about keeping their distance from the insanity, and fewer turned away from arena adulation and the pop charts to do standards, operetta, and Mexican folk songs.

Ronstadt was the most spectacular female singer of the rock era, her voice a thing of astonishing clarity and power and color. Due respect is here, in the documentary Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice. What she did with a song like “Hurt So Bad” or “How Do I Make You” could blast you backwards into a reverse somersault, like a Peanuts character. Yet she was near her peak when she walked away from rock. Today she’s 73 and can’t sing, at least not in public: Parkinson’s.

Directed by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, this restrained and respectful film tells the story the way Ronstadt evidently wants it told (no mention of famous boyfriends and no mention that she never married). Ronstadt looks back on her upbringing just north of the border in Tucson, where her German-Mexican dad sang Spanish songs to her in a lovely baritone. As a kid, she thought Spanish was for singing and English was for speaking; at the time, Mexican-American kids were often discouraged from speaking Spanish. When a Tucson friend moved to L.A. when she was a teen, she joined up with him and another musician to form the Stone Poneys. A folky song they did in clubs, “Different Drum,” was reworked and heavily produced in the studios of Capitol Records to showcase her voice, and the single launched her career in 1967, when she was 21.

(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Miscellaneous; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: cover; covers; jerrybrown; laurelcanyon; lindaronstadt; music; nevertrump; nevertrumper; nevertrumpers; neverwroteanote; ronstadt
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It's such a shame that Ms. Ronstadt is suffering from Parkinson's Disease. It's a horrific way to go.

She was such an incredible talent. Her hiring the Nelson Riddle Orchestra was a stroke of genius.

1 posted on 09/05/2019 9:50:53 PM PDT by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: simpson96; Kathy in Alaska; SkyPilot

Pinging you because of your interest in / love of Linda Ronstadt.


2 posted on 09/05/2019 9:51:30 PM PDT by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: ProtectOurFreedom

She dated Jerry Brown! Enough said!


3 posted on 09/05/2019 9:57:40 PM PDT by notaliberal (St. Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle,)
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To: ProtectOurFreedom
Only remembrance of her later years was the accounting of a concert where she launched into a "hate-Bush" diatribe and had half the audience supposedly get up and walked out.

That said, "Different Drum" was a profound anthem for us in VN in 67-68.

4 posted on 09/05/2019 9:58:10 PM PDT by doorgunner69
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To: ProtectOurFreedom

She had a crush on Don Everly as a kid and dated
Jerry Moonbeam Brown when got older, That’s what I
know about her.


5 posted on 09/05/2019 9:59:09 PM PDT by Sivad (Trump is guilty of obstruction of injustice....)
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To: ProtectOurFreedom

She is a TDS level 6 Trump hater who will not socialize with any conservative or Republican family member.


6 posted on 09/05/2019 10:05:55 PM PDT by P-Marlowe (Freep mail me if you want to be on my Fingerstyle Acoustic Guitar Ping List)
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To: ProtectOurFreedom
I've loved her from the first time I heard her voice, and the first time that I saw her face.


7 posted on 09/05/2019 10:06:01 PM PDT by BeauBo
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To: BeauBo

Selena Gomez is her Doppelganger.


8 posted on 09/05/2019 10:07:52 PM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: notaliberal

I never liked her politics, but I’ll praise her talent as a gift. She comes from a very musical family. Listen to her first cousin sometime (David Lindley).


9 posted on 09/05/2019 10:09:42 PM PDT by taxpayerfatigue (Taxpayer Fatigue)
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To: ProtectOurFreedom

Very sad but she has given a great gift to the world. Not everything is political, you idiots...

BTW, read her book. She wrote every word herself and it’s an interesting story and gives a better perspective on why she sees her talent and career as she does.


10 posted on 09/05/2019 10:11:15 PM PDT by bigbob (Trust Trump. Trust the Plan.)
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To: P-Marlowe

And what’s that got to go with her talent?


11 posted on 09/05/2019 10:11:52 PM PDT by bigbob (Trust Trump. Trust the Plan.)
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To: ProtectOurFreedom

I saw an interview of her a year or so ago and if they hadn’t said it was her, I wouldn’t have recognized her right off. She’s where a lot of us will wind up if we are around long enough. She sure was something, though, way back before all that.


12 posted on 09/05/2019 10:19:20 PM PDT by Southside_Chicago_Republican (The more I learn about people, the more I like my dog.)
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To: ProtectOurFreedom

Her “Simple Dreams” album was one of my first records, as a kid in the 70’s.

Sorry to hear of her troubles.


13 posted on 09/05/2019 10:24:17 PM PDT by Tired of Taxes
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To: ProtectOurFreedom
Ronstadt was the most spectacular female singer of the rock era

I contend that the most spectacular female singer of the rock era was Etta James.

Good Rockin' Daddy--Etta James & the Peaches (1955)

14 posted on 09/05/2019 10:24:57 PM PDT by Fiji Hill
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To: ProtectOurFreedom

For musical interest only

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=haZPPBJC8Ic

Jeff “Skunk” Baxter on congas, and Andrew Gold on lead guitar.


15 posted on 09/05/2019 10:26:47 PM PDT by SaveFerris (Luke 17:28 ... as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold ......)
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To: notaliberal

“She dated Jerry Brown! Enough said!”

Join me in denouncing her stinking political views.

Then listen to her recordings of country music classics - “I Fall To Pieces” and “Crazy Arms.” It has never been done better.

And to think it had to be done by a rock star.


16 posted on 09/05/2019 10:28:16 PM PDT by jeffersondem
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To: ProtectOurFreedom

Your first paragraph was so nice and so glowing with praise, I started getting nervous. I thought maybe she had ‘gone to that Blue Bayou on the top floor’.

Yes, she was deeply talented. A perfect voice for that kind of music. Just as Julie Andrews had the perfect voice for her type of Rodgers & Hammerstein music.

Ann Wilson of Heart is also a treasure. Ann was lucky to have
her sister Nancy to work with. Together they created just the right accompaniment for Ann’s voice and style of delivery.


17 posted on 09/05/2019 10:31:31 PM PDT by lee martell
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To: SaveFerris

Thank you for that.

I grew up watching The Midnight Special and Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert.

Loved MTV too, until they stopped playing real music.


18 posted on 09/05/2019 10:38:12 PM PDT by Salamander (Death makes angels of us all, and give us wings where we once had shoulders, smooth as ravens' claws)
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To: jeffersondem
I liked her music at the time.....

I have to wonder if any avowed conservative patriotic singer/songwriter ever in the history of the world been praised for their talent by the leftist media without a huge dis about their politics...as if being patriotic is politics....

so I think its perfectly legit to bring up her very outspoken anti conservative/patriot/republican hatred....

19 posted on 09/05/2019 10:40:53 PM PDT by cherry
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To: Salamander

I watched Midnight Special and Rock Concert too.

I miss the 70’s. Lot’s of 60’s and 70’s cars around.

Head out, get a cheeseburger and a Coke or a shake.

These days a Superbird with a 426 Hemi can easily set you back $300,000. I can still get my double-cheeseburger, tater tots and large Coke for $10-$11.

But I’m $300,000 short on the Superbird / Dodge Daytona.


20 posted on 09/05/2019 10:43:17 PM PDT by SaveFerris (Luke 17:28 ... as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold ......)
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