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Aretha Franklin, one of the greats, died yesterday, at age 76.

Here's one of her performances that you might not expect: "Nessun Dorma" at the 1998 Grammys. Luciano Pavarotti was supposed to perform but he was ill, so Ms. Franklin stepped in:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIHlvOjc5cU" target="_blank

All I could say was..... Wow. We'll miss her.

Aretha was more than the "big hits", of which there were many. Her gospel work is wonderful and some of her lesser known popular music was stunning.

"The Weight" at Muscle Shoals w/Duane Allman

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGdxpnG ... gs=pl%2Cwn" target="_blank

"It Ain't Fair" At Muscle Shoals w/ Duane Allman on slide, King Curtis on saxophone.. I heard this for the first time recently.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7E_jz3 ... gs=pl%2Cwn" target="_blank

Heavy_Metal wrote:Aretha Franklin, one of the greats, died yesterday, at age 76.

Here's one of her performances that you might not expect: "Nessun Dorma" at the 1998 Grammys. Luciano Pavarotti was supposed to perform but he was ill, so Ms. Franklin stepped in:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIHlvOjc5cU" target="_blank" target="_blank

All I could say was..... Wow. We'll miss her.

The story of that night blows my mind.

Sure, she performed Nessun Dorma a week or so earlier, but this was in a higher key (I think), and she had a whiz-bang rehearsal with the conductor and a boom box in her dressing room while the rest of the show was going on.

I keep putting myself in her chair: "Hey, Pavarotti's sick, can you cover Nessun Dorma on the biggest music broadcast of the year?"

What'd she answer with? "Yeah, I can do that."

Holy cow.

AND I read somewhere that Aretha Franklin played tuba in her high school band!

Frank Byrne wrote:AND I read somewhere that Aretha Franklin played tuba in her high school band!

just saw that on FB & googled it & found this:
http://books.google.com/books?id=bfchhP ... ba&f=false

Leland wrote: The story of that night blows my mind.

Sure, she performed Nessun Dorma a week or so earlier, but this was in a higher key (I think), and she had a whiz-bang rehearsal with the conductor and a boom box in her dressing room while the rest of the show was going on.

I keep putting myself in her chair: "Hey, Pavarotti's sick, can you cover Nessun Dorma on the biggest music broadcast of the year?"

What'd she answer with? "Yeah, I can do that."

Holy cow.

Exactly. A musician's musician if there ever was one. Who else could have pulled that off? Not many............

FYI, from age 5 she was raised in Detroit not Memphis. Her tuba playing days would have been in Detroit.