Three days before Aretha Franklin died, I got a call from an editor at the New York Times, asking if I could put together an oral history of the Queen of Soul’s amazing 2015 performance of “Natural Woman” at the Kennedy Center (honoring Carole King). The catch was that since she didn’t have very long to live, I had only 24 hours to get the story done. It turned out to be the best kind of therapy: although I was grieving the loss of one of the greatest singers of the 20th century, I got to talk about her genius with people who loved her and had spent time with her. As always with pieces like this, nothing happened at first and I despaired of getting anyone at all to talk to me, and then in the final hour before the deadline I ended up juggling Cicely Tyson and James Taylor. You can read the article here.

posted 10 September 2018 in Articles, Outside and tagged Aretha Franklin, New York Times. no comments yet