The singer Roberta Flack, whose signature voice and moving songs of songs such as “Killing Me Softly with her song” Herdait-Hyd to the Top of the Charts and Influency Generations, died. She was 88 years old.
The legendary singer died on Monday, according to a press release from her representatives provided in ABC News. No cause of death was shared in the declaration.
“We have a broken heart that the glorious Roberta Flack died this morning on February 24, 2025,” said the statement. “She died peacefully surrounded by her family. Roberta beat limits and files. She was also a proud educator,” said the statement.
Roberta Flack performs in Hammersmith Apollo in London on July 18, 2006.
Brian Rasic / Getty Images
Flack was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, otherwise known as SLA in 2022, which led to the loss of its singing voice, its publicists said at the time.
Flack dominated the charts in the 1970s with successes, including “The First Time II Saw Your Face”, “Killing Me Softly with his song”, “Feel Like Makin ‘Love”, “Where is the love” and “The Flacher i get for you. “
The singer was nominated for 14 Grammy Awards, winning five – including a lifetime price. She was the first artist to win the Grammy Award for record of the year during the consecutive years – for “The First Time I Saw Your Face” in 1973 and “Killing Me Softly With Song” in 1974. The latter would resume Again the charts three decades later with a coverage of the fugers.
Roberta Flack sings on his special television which was broadcast on June 19, 1973.
ABC Photo Archive / Disney Entertainment Content via Getty Images, File
The influence of Flack “is looming on the two rs& B and indie “bedroom”, “musical criticism ann powerrs wrote in a 2020 testCalling Flack a “Titan in the eyes of many other demanding artists and fans”.
“In more than half a century of music manufacturing, she established herself as one of the most distinctive song stylists in the pop arena,” wrote Powers.
Flack was born in Black Mountain, North Carolina, in a musical family; His mother was an organist of the church and his father a self -taught jazz pianist. Prodigy on the piano, she won a complete music scholarship at Howard University, which she started attending the age of 15. It was there that she met her friend and close collaborator, the late Donny Hathaway.
Her initial objective was not to be a superstar singer, but a classic concert pianist.
“My real ambition was to be a concert pianist and play Schumann and Bach and Chopin – the romantics. They were my guys”, Flack Tell NPR in 2012.
Flack taught in schools for several years before being discovered by McCann while playing jazz in a Washington nightclub, DC, which helped him get a hearing with his first label, Atlantic Records.
Several years after having signed with Atlantic, Clint Eastwood chose “the first time I saw Your Face” of his first album of 1969 for the soundtrack of his 1971 film, “Play Misty for me” – bringing Flack to A general public. “Killing Me Softly” helped cement it like a star.
“It was unexpected and breathtaking,” said Flack in an email at The Guardian in a Profile 2020. “The transition from my life to Washington as a teacher in this kind of attention has been surreal.”
During the 1970s, Flack recorded duos regularly with Hathaway – including the tubes “Where is the Love” and “The Closer I Get to You” – until his death in 1979.
In the 1980s, she started working with Peabo Bryson, including on the successful single “Tonight, I famous my love”, and also had a successful duo with Maxi Priest with “Set The Night To Music”. On television, she sang “Together through the Years”, the theme song of the show “Valerie”, later known as “The Hogan Family”, which lasted six seasons.
Later in her career, she released “Let It Be Roberta”, a collection of Beatles Covers, in 2012. Her latest album, “Running”, was released in 2018. She retired from the tour the same year.
In 2020, she received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement prize. Among other distinctions, the Berklee College of Music awarded him an honorary doctorate in May in May 2023.
His heritage extends beyond his music. In 2010, she founded the Roberta Flack Foundation, which supported musical education. She was also spokesperson for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, with her song “The First Time I Saw Your Face” presented in an advertisement for the organization.
Roberta Flack performs at the Rain Forest concert at Carnegie Hall, April 27, 1998 in New York.
New York Daily News archives via Getty Images
A long -standing goal, Flack has published a children’s book, “The Green Piano: How Little found me music” in 2023, written with Tonya Bolden, who paid tribute to her musical start: child, she Practiced on a former right piano, she had found in a dump and painted green for her. In its author’s note, Flack urges readers: “Find your own” green piano “and practice tirelessly until you find your voice, and a way to put this beautiful music in the world.”
The documentary, “American Masters: Roberta Flack”, released on PBS in January 2023, celebrated the icon of the music industry.
“She understands that an artist can offer us a voice when we do not find ours, capturing thoughts and a range of emotions through her song and his piano,” wrote Antonino d’Ambrosio, the director of the film, in a Documentary test.
According to her own words, Flack said she always wanted to be faithful to herself.
“I have not tried to be a soul singer, a jazz singer, a blues singer – no category,” Flack wrote to The Guardian. “My music is my expression of what I feel and I believe in an instant.”
Flack was married to the jazz musician Steve Novosel from 1966 to 1972. She was the godmother of the musician Bernard Wright, died in May 2022.
His niece is the Rory Flack professional ice skater.
