Roberta Flack of Killing Me Softly fame dies at 88

NEW YORK – Roberta Flack, the Grammy-winning singer behind the classic Killing Me Softly With His Song (1973) and one of the most recognisable voices of the 1970s, died on Feb 24 at age 88.

Flack’s publicist announced her death without citing a cause.

The influential pop and R&B star had in recent years lost her ability to sing because of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, commonly known as ALS or Lou Gehrig’s disease, which she was diagnosed with in 2022.

“She died peacefully surrounded by her family,” the statement from the publicist said.

The classically trained musician with a tender voice produced a number of early classics of rhythm and blues that she frequently described as “scientific soul”, timeless works that blended meticulous practice with impeccable taste.

Her work was key to the “quiet storm” radio form of smooth, sensuous, slow jams that popularised R&B and influenced its later aesthetics.

“I’ve been told I sound like Nina Simone, Nancy Wilson, Odetta, Barbra Streisand, Dionne Warwick, even Mahalia Jackson,” Flack said in 1970 in The New York Times. “If everybody said I sounded like one person, I’d worry. But when they say I sound like them all, I know I’ve got my own style.”

American singer-actress Jennifer Hudson hailed Flack as “one of the great soul singers of all time” on social media, and The Roots’ drummer Questlove wrote: “Thank you, Roberta Flack. Rest in melody.”

‘A lot of love’

Born Roberta Cleopatra Flack in Black Mountain, North Carolina, on Feb 10, 1937, the artiste was raised in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington, DC.

Her large, musical family had a penchant for gospel, and she took up the piano in her youth, exhibiting a virtuosity that ultimately earned her a music scholarship to Howard University at just 15.

She told Forbes magazine in 2021 that her father “found an old, smelly piano in a junkyard and restored it for me and painted it green”. “This was my first piano and was the instrument in which I found my expression and inspiration as a young person.”

She was a regular playing clubs in Washington, where she was eventually discovered by late American jazz musician Les McCann.

Flack signed at Atlantic Records, launching a recording career at the relatively late age of 32.

But her star grew overnight after American actor-director Clint Eastwood used her romantic ballad The First Time I Ever Saw Your Face (1969) on the soundtrack of his 1971 movie Play Misty For Me.

Eastwood’s production company, Malpaso Productions, posted a photo of the pair on X, captioning it: “Rest in peace, Roberta Flack...”

The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face earned Flack the Grammy for Record of the Year in 1972, a prize which she took home at the following ceremony as well, for Killing Me Softly With His Song, becoming the first artiste to win the honour two years in a row.

Flack has described hearing Killing Me Softly, which was recorded by American folk singer Lori Lieberman in 1971, on a flight and quickly rearranging it.

She performed her version at a show in which she opened for the late legendary music tastemaker Quincy Jones, who, blown away by her rendition, told Flack not to publicly perform the song again until she had recorded it and made it her own.

It would become the defining hit of her career.

A remixed rendition of Killing Me Softly was released in 1996 by American hip-hop group Fugees, with American singer Lauryn Hill on lead vocals, bringing Flack a resurgence as it soared to top charts worldwide and scored another Grammy.

Flack also forged a creative partnership with late American soul singer Donny Hathaway, a friend of hers from Howard University, releasing an album of duets that included Where Is The Love (1972) and a rendition of American singer Carole King’s You’ve Got A Friend (1971).

Flack’s many accolades included a Lifetime Achievement honour from the Recording Academy in 2020.

She was a figure in the mid-20th century’s social movements, and was friends with Reverend Jesse Jackson and activist Angela Davis. She sang at the funeral of baseball icon Jackie Robinson, Major League Baseball’s first black player.

She has described growing up “at a time ‘black’ was the most derogatory word you could use”.

“I went through the civil rights movement. I learnt, long after leaving Black Mountain, that being black was a positive thing, as all of us did, the most positive thing we could be”, she said.

“I did a lot of songs that were considered protest songs, a lot of folk music, but I protested as a singer with a lot of love.” AFP