Roberta Flack, who inspired generations of singers with her subtle folk/jazz/blues storytelling that captured romance along with the emotional breadth of a conflicted society, died on Feb. 24 at her Upper West Side apartment, where she had lived for 40 years. She was 88.
“She died at home surrounded by her family,” publicist Elaine Schock said in a statement. The cause was cardiac arrest. Flack announced in 2022 that she had ALS, commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, and could no longer sing.
Flack received a lifetime achievement award from the Jazz Foundation of America in 2018 and the Grammy Lifetime Achievement award two years later. Early on, she had won four consecutive Grammy Awards — Record of the Year for “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” (1972), Best Vocal Performance by a Duo for “Where Is the Love” with Donny Hathaway (1973), and both Record of the Year and Best Pop Vocal Performance Female for “Killing Me Softly with His Song” (1974).
Flack’s vocals were an addictive pleasure that engaged all listeners. She had a stylistic range that soared with spiritual conviction, taking your breath away with her every note. One could say she invoked folk music. but her perfect enunciation, timbre, and subtleties captured the ancestral spirits of storytelling — the oral griot. She sang with an emotional passion that turned songs into vivid vignettes, pulling listeners in as active participants feeling her words, whirling in the lyrical reality, a ring-shot experience that converged in your soul while plucking your heartstrings.
As a singer and pianist, Flack traveled the path of Carmen McRae, Nina Simone, and Aretha Franklin. They were all lyrical storytellers. Simone, like Flack, was a staunch supporter of racial equality, recording songs such as “Mississippi Goddam,” “Four Women,” and “Why? The King of Love is Dead.” Flack expressed her commitment to Black solidarity with such infectious subtleties as “Tryin’ Times” (First Take, 1969) and “Business Goes on as Usual” (Chapter 2, 1970), which was a significant Anti-Vietnam War anthem.
Flack’s most heartfelt but defiant song was “The Impossible Dream” (Chapter 2) — you can fly in her high notes and feel the heat of her explosive lyrics. It is a song for now. “To dream the impossible dream/ To run where the brave dare not go/ To try when your arms are too weary to reach the unreachable star/ This is my quest, to follow that star no matter how hopeless, no matter how far/ And the world will be better for this/ One man scorned and covered with scars still strong with his last ounce of courage.”
One jaunty, bluesy, humorous track, “Reverend Lee,” illustrates Flack’s skill as a storyteller similar to Oscar Brown, Jr. She was so creatively adept that even songs she covered became her own. She managed to reconstruct the well-travelled Beatles song “Let It Be Me” into a memorable Flack special. Some years later, when she recorded her 15th studio album, “Let It Be Roberta” (subtitled “Roberta Flack Sings the Beatles” Sony Music 2012), she introduced a jazzy coat of inventive contemporary rhythms and blues that gave it a definitive Flack glow. (She lived next door to John Lennon and Yoko Ono in Manhattan’s Dakota Apartments.)
Flack effortlessly corralled blues, jazz, and folk into her own blended genre, which made her one of America’s most influential singers. Her music of the 1970s has maintained an inspirational relevance in today’s world. Her classical training gave her the ability to accompany herself on the piano in any style.
Donny Hathaway, Flack’s friend from Howard University, became her regular collaborator. As a duet, they scored two Grammys and recorded two albums until Hathaway’s death in 1979. Their 1972 release “Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway” (Atlantic Records) featured 10 tracks that included “You’ve Got A Friend,” a big hit; the sensuous, romantic ballad “Be Real Black for Me,” which was deep in soul; and the gospel hymn “Come Ye Disconsolate,” straight from the front pew of any Baptist Church. After Hathaway’s death, she released “Roberta Flack Featuring Donny Hathaway.” One major hit from the LP was “Back Together Again” written by Reggie Lucas and James Mtume (Atlantic Records, 1980).
“We were deeply connected creatively,” Flack told “Vibe” in 2022, on the 50th anniversary of the million-selling “Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway” album. “He could play anything, sing anything. Our musical synergy was unlike (anything) I’d had before or since.”
Roberta Cleopatra Flack was born on Feb. 10, 1937, in Black Mountain, N.C., the second-oldest of five siblings. The family moved to Richmond, Va, and then to Arlington. Her father, Laron Flack, was a draftsman in the Veterans Administration; her mother, Irene (Council) Flack, was a cook at a high school who also taught music and played the organ at Arlington’s A.M.E. Zion Church. “I grew up playing piano for the choir: Handel, Bach, Verdi, Mozart, and all those great, wonderful, intricately written Negro spirituals,” Flack recalled in an interview with the “Chicago Tribune” in 1991.
Her classical piano skills earned her a full music scholarship to Howard University in Washington, D.C., where, at 15, she became one of the youngest students to ever enroll there and graduate while still a teenager. After graduating from Howard, she taught music in D.C.-area junior high schools for several years in her 20s while performing after hours in local clubs. She sometimes backed other singers, but her own shows at Washington’s Mr. Henry’s attracted a huge cult following. The composer Burt Bacharach, who was behind many of Dionne Warwick’s early ’60s hits, penned Flack’s 1982 hit “Making Love” (the title track of the 1982 film of the same name).
When pianist and vocalist Les McCann heard her in 1968 at a nearby club, he was amazed. He later wrote in the liner notes to her debut album, “I laughed, cried and screamed for more.” McCann arranged an Atlantic Records audition for her. Company executive Joel Dorn was so impressed that he signed her immediately.
Flack’s debut album, “First Take,” a blend of gospel, blues, and jazz, came out in 1969. One track was a love song by the English folk artist Ewan MacColl: “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face,” written in 1957 for his future wife, singer Peggy Seeger. Flack not only knew of the ballad, but had used it in her music classes during her years as an educator.
Her Atlantic recordings began generating sales after actor/director Clint Eastwood used “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” for the soundtrack of his directorial debut, “Play Misty for Me.” Atlantic rush-released the song as a single and it became the biggest hit of 1972.
Flack mentored and performed duets with Peabo Bryson — “Tonight, I Celebrate My Love” (1983) and Maxi Priest — “Set the Night to Music.” She was instrumental in the solo career of Luther Vandross, who was one of her background singers. She recorded the soundtrack to the 1981 Richard Pryor film “Bustin’ Loose.”
During a tour of South Africa in 1999, Flack performed “Killing Me Softly” for President Nelson Mandela at his home in Johannesburg. Through her interest in the arts, she funded and helped launch the Roberta Flack School of Music at the Hyde Leadership Charter School in the Bronx, from 2006 to 2011.
In the mid-’90s, Flack received new attention after the Fugees (Wyclef Jean, Lauryn Hill, and Pras Michel) recorded a Grammy-winning cover of “Killing Me Softly,” which she eventually performed on stage with the hip-hop group.
“I love that connection to other artists because we understand music, we live music, it’s our language,” Flack told songwriteruniverse.com in 2020. “Through music, we understand what we are thinking and feeling. No matter what challenge life presents, I am at home with my piano, on a stage, with my band, in the studio, listening to music. I can find my way when I hear music.”
Flack has no immediate survivors. A seven-year marriage to the bassist Steve Novosel (which violated the law in Virginia, where interracial marriage was still illegal when she married him, who is white) ended in divorce.
A celebration of Flack’s life will be held on Monday, Mar. 10, at 4 p.m. at Abyssinian Baptist Church (132 West 138th Street). The public is welcome to attend.