The older I get, the more I understand why the powers that be called it “soul music.” It’s the sound that wafted through my childhood when my folks cleaned the house on the weekend, when they drove to the grocery store, and whenever I sat at the kids’ table during more cookouts and holiday dinners than I can count.
Whatever the adults selected, it served as background music that somehow snuck into my subconscious. No matter how it got there, that music worked its way into my cells by sonic osmosis when I was growing up.
Nay, the music worked its way into my soul.
Two of the great providers of the music in me, Roberta Flack and Jerry Butler, recently ended their musical journeys here on Earth. Butler passed on February 20, 2025; Flack left us four days later. They were 85 and 88, respectively. Both deserve a moment of reflection and few words of tribute.
The Mississippi-born Butler was an original member of Curtis Mayfield’s group “The Impressions,” co-writing and singing their first hit 1958’s “For Your Precious Love.” Though he left the group, he and Mayfield collaborated often—they cowrote Butler’s solo hit “He Will Break Your Heart,” which was introduced to me as a kid not by Butler, but by Tony Orlando and Dawn!
Come to think of it, “The Ice Man,” as Butler was known, wrote several songs that I first heard sung by different artists. For example, Isaac Hayes’ take on Butler’s “I Stand Accused” was on heavy rotation in my Pops’ record player. “I stand accused of loving you too much,” Ike crooned. “And I hope it’s not a crime. Because if it is, I’m guilty.” I adored this song long before I knew what that kind of love was all about.
When Butler sang other people’s songs, he had just as great an effect. His cover of “Moon River” makes you wish he was sitting on that fire escape in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” instead of Audrey Hepburn.
The one Butler song etched in permanent marker on my soul is his 1968 classic “Only the Strong Survive.” And not just because my Pops wore the grooves off that record. Using that majestic, gravel-inflected voice of his, Butler sings about the best advice his mother ever gave him. Hint: it’s in the title.
Like all great soul music, Butler’s song makes you feel like you’re back at your Mama’s house.
Since I am rarely a serious man, my first thought when I heard of Flack’s passing was my mother hastily pressing the next song button on the 8-track player in my Pops’ car. The lady in the speakers was singing about how she felt “like makin’ love to you.” Like most of us, I overheard “baby-makin’ music” long before I knew how to make babies.
“Makin’ love” was mentioned in a lot of songs my mother fast-forwarded through, or demanded my Pops turn off, if my ears were present back in the day. Granted, Flack’s 1974 hit “Feel Like Makin’ Love” is far from filthy, but it quickly became verboten. To this day, I can’t listen to that song without laughing about how fast my mother censored it.
Thankfully, Roberta Flack’s impressive mixture of jazz, funk, R&B and soul wasn’t withheld from me entirely. The pianist from Black Mountain, North Carolina was allowed to sing one of her personal favorites, “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face,” within my earshot. As a kid, I didn’t get the slow, aching beauty of the song she recorded three years before it became a hit when Clint Eastwood used it in 1971’s “Play Misty for Me.”
However, what I did get, with unforgettable precision, was that voice. Diana Ross’ voice was wispy, a lace curtain caressing your face. Aretha’s voice was the Holy Ghost entering your body through your eardrums. Roberta Flack’s voice was a bit of both–it was ethereal. There was something otherworldly about its clarity and crispness. It drifted in on some heavenly sound wave and lifted you to a higher plane. And you felt it vibrating through your soul.
Whether Flack was celebrating her love for you or reminding you that “God don’t like ugly,” she took your breath away with ease. Like ‘Re, Flack could also turn words into syllabic pretzels. I’m not even talking about the run she does in “Killing Me Softly With His Song,”—that “oh, oh, oh” has been slaughtered by more wannabe singers at wedding receptions than Frankie Beverly’s take on the word “go” in “Before I Let Go.”
I’m referring to a line she sang in my favorite Donny Hathaway-Roberta Flack duet, “You are My Heaven.” Nobody did sad love song duets like those two (their blended harmonies on “Where is the Love” rips your heart out), but “Heaven’s” an upbeat, bouncy and danceable ditty celebrating one’s life partner. In it, she sings:
“If someone tries to tell you that I do not love you, tell them they must be out of their mind.”
I shall never forget the way she turned the word “mind” into a rising, forceful three syllable punctuation mark at the end of that sentence. Yes, it’s just one word, but it makes that statement definitive.
Since we’re on a movie site, I should mention Flack’s lovely score for one of the many R-rated movies I snuck into, Richard Pryor’s 1981 classic, “Bustin’ Loose.” Whenever I feel down, I just listen to “The Children’s Song” from that soundtrack. And since my Mom can no longer stop me from hearing it, I can blast “Feel Like Makin’ Love” whenever I want!
RIP to these two legends. Their souls may have departed, but their soulful music remains.
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