Roberta Flack, interpreter of one of the most famous versions of ‘Killing Me Softly With His Song’ and author of great albums such as ‘First Take’ (1969) or ‘Killing Me Softly’ (1973), has died in the morning of this Monday, February 24 at 88, Variety has confirmed. The cause of the death of Flack is unknown for now, although the artist suffered amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and for a long time it was not possible to sing.
Flack will be remembered for his version of ‘Killing Me Softly With His Song’, a song that will always be associated with her even if she did not compose her of her fist and lyrics. It was a composition of Charles Fox and Norman Gimbel who first recorded Lori Lieberman in 1971, without success.
Between 1973 and 1974, the Flack version of ‘Killing Me Softly with His Song’ reached the number 1 of singles in the United States and won two Grammys, including the recording of the year. In 1996, the version of the Fugees popularized the song again, taking it to number 1 of about twenty countries: the story of Ms. Lauryn Hill would become inseparable from that of Flack.
Flack had previously win It was used to awaken astronauts aboard Apollo 17, during the last manned mission to the moon. In 2020 it was versioned by James Blake.
Flack, who had studied piano since the age of nine, obtained in his musical work a sophisticated and adult sound that hybridized influences of soul, jazz yy folk. His albums were very loved by critics and have been able to appear on the lists of the best of all time, especially his 1969 debut, ‘First Take’. On his last album, Flack versioned the Beatles.
