Aretha invited me to the Grammy activities in New York in February 1998, thinking we might have time to do some interviews for the book. We didn’t. She was understandably preoccupied with the events at hand.
The week kicked off at a dinner at Le Cirque 2000, the posh Madison Avenue restaurant at the Palace Hotel. Aretha, an avid reader of Gourmet magazine, was excited about visiting the establishment celebrated for haute cuisine. Curious about the chef’s approach to beef, fowl, and fish, she ordered several main courses. When the food arrived and she was not completely satisfied with the tastes, she opened her purse and fished out an economy-size bottle of Lawry’s seasoned salt that she generously sprinkled on the food. Her brother Vaughn, sensing the waiter’s disapproval, leaned over to me and whispered, “I’ve seen chefs come out of the kitchen and tell her to put that Lawry’s away, but she doesn’t care. She does this all the time. And I think she’s right. I think this food is underseasoned.”
The next night, at a MusiCares charity event with Luciano Pavarotti present, she sang “Nessun Dorma,” the famous aria from Puccini’s Turandot. With the help of her opera coach, she had been practicing the piece at home for several months, singing to a tape of the full orchestration. Her rendition, while hardly conventional, was greeted with a standing ovation.
“Opera purists may take issue with your liberties,” Pavarotti told her afterward, “but I loved your interpretation. Puccini has great soul but you made his soul even greater. Will you do me the honor of coming to my home in Modena, where we can record together?”
When Aretha explained that she didn’t fly, Pavarotti said, “I have a private jet and a pilot who makes flying in the plane more soothing than taking a bubble bath. I will dispatch the jet for you and you alone, my dear Miss Franklin.”
Aretha expressed gratitude and said she might just take him up on his offer. She invited him to Detroit for one of her homemade soul-food dinners.
“Nothing would please me more,” he said, “but I am in terrible pain. You see, I am preparing for hip surgery. But the moment I recover, I am instructing my pilot to head for Detroit and, afterwards, we will head back to Italy.”
Aretha was charmed, Pavarotti was charmed, and the evening, according to Aretha, was a triumph.
Three days later, on the evening of February 25, it was Grammy time. On the stage of Radio City Music Hall, Aretha was scheduled to sing “Respect.” Some thirty minutes later, Pavarotti was set to sing the same aria Aretha had sung at MusiCares, “Nessun Dorma.”
After “Respect,” Aretha returned to her dressing room, where producer Ken Ehrlich was waiting for her. Ehrlich told her that the ailing Pavarotti had canceled at the last minute. Was there any way in the world that Aretha could step in and take his place? Naturally Aretha wanted to know the details. Would the orchestra be playing the same arrangement she had used at MusiCares? No. It was a different arrangement and a much larger orchestra—sixty-five pieces, plus a twenty-voice choir. Did Ehrlich have a tape of the arrangement? Did he know if it was in Aretha’s key? He answered yes to both questions. But hearing the first few notes, Aretha realized it was not in her key. She asked him exactly when the piece was scheduled to be performed. Ehrlich looked at his watch. Less than twenty minutes from then. The assumption—given that it was a strange arrangement and written in an uncomfortable key—was that Aretha couldn’t and wouldn’t do it.
Yet, after thinking about the situation for less than twenty seconds, she nodded her head. “I’ll do it,” she said. With that, she asked that everyone leave the dressing room so she could concentrate on the tape.
Twenty minutes later, introduced by Sting, who explained the last-minute nature of the performance, Aretha stepped back out onstage. Wearing a red brocade dress with mink cuffs and a mink collar, she appeared calm, as if she had been rehearsing this moment for hours on end. The Puccini aria, written for a man, is all about determination. A suitor is determined to win the hand of a princess by solving a riddle. The culmination of the aria comes with a repetition of the word Vincerò, “I will win.” The text suited the singer. Aretha was determined to win. She had everything going for her—her fine-tuned sense of pitch, her still relatively enormous range, her unshakable confidence, and the fact that she had been carefully studying this piece for months. That studying had convinced her; if she could interpret Hoagy Carmichael and Johnny Mercer’s “Skylark” as a twenty-one-year-old—and she had, magnificently—then she could certainly interpret Puccini at age fifty-six. Grand opera—at least Puccini’s brand of grand opera—shared many of the same elements as melodies from the Great American Songbook.
“When I heard Aretha sing ‘Nessun Dorma’ that night,” said Jerry Wexler, “I thought of the one night I spent with Frank Sinatra discussing music. Sinatra adored Puccini and was convinced that all the great American tunesmiths—Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, and especially George Gershwin—came out of Puccini. He was surprised that more jazz musicians hadn’t taken Puccini melodies and used them as the basis of improvisation. Well, Aretha understood exactly what Sinatra had understood—you didn’t have to sing Puccini literally. She could use her own stylistic devices—and no one employs more of those devices than Aretha—in sculpting his songs according to her own vocal vision. That night, everyone saw that Aretha had a helluva vision. The top of her voice might have been a little rough, but the bottom was all syrup and molasses. The bottom was beautiful. She swooped down to the bottom of those passages with great elasticity. Mainly, though, it was the feeling that got her over. She wasn’t afraid of the aria. She owned it, claimed it, and made it her own. After she hit that last note, the crowd jumped to its feet and started hooting and hollering, celebrating what was undeniable—she had pulled it off!”
There were other surprises at the Grammys. During Bob Dylan’s performance, a shirtless man with Soy Bomb written across his chest had jumped onstage; Ol’ Dirty Bastard had jumped onstage while Shawn Colvin was speaking. Barbra Streisand canceled her duet performance with Celine Dion. Yet the evening will be remembered as the night that Aretha took on Puccini. For the most part, the reaction was positive.
Billboard’s headline read “The Grammys: Big Wins, Big Buzz.” The article noted, “Apparently, an artist doesn’t even need to be nominated in order to bask in the retail afterglow of the Grammys. Soul legend Aretha Franklin appears poised to enjoy a rush of consumer interest after simply performing on the show.”
A week later, Fred Bronson’s Chart Beat column in Billboard put Aretha’s achievement in historical perspective. “‘A Rose Is Still a Rose,’ new at No. 43, is the first Franklin single to chart since ‘Willing to Forgive’ peaked at No. 26 in 1994. It’s only the third Franklin chart entry in the ’90s, but it does extend the superstar chart span to 37 years and two weeks.” Bronson pointed out that Franklin’s span on Arista was now over seventeen years, longer than her chart history on Columbia (seven years) and Atlantic (ten years).
As an artist battling to stay current in the ever-changing, ever-fickle American pop music market, Aretha had demonstrated tremendous resilience. But the Grammy performance and the release of A Rose Is Still a Rose would prove to be her last significant commercial moment—at least as of this writing. Because of the success of her “Nessun Dorma” performance, there was also the possibility of singing with symphony orchestras.
“We were all certain,” said Erma, “that Aretha’s opera success would move her career in a new and exciting direction.”
“Offers from classical-music venues started rolling in,” said Vaughn. “They wanted Aretha to sing some of those arias in famous concert halls across the country—and Europe as well. It opened up a whole new world, and for a while it looked like Aretha would go down that path. But it never really happened. She likes to be in complete control of her concerts, down to the last detail. I understand that. I understand why, coming in to Boston or Cleveland to sing with their symphony orchestras, she’s not comfortable being under the direction of some distinguished conductor or famous maestro. She wants to be the director and the maestro. She wants to run the show, and, after all these years in the business, isn’t she entitled to?”
“There’s a precedent for the career redirection that Aretha might have adopted after her Grammys triumph,” said Jerry Wexler. “Sarah Vaughan had played symphony dates for years. The New York Philharmonic, for example, might play Mahler for the first half, then after intermission, Sarah would come out and, with the strings soaring behind her, she’d sing Gershwin’s ‘Summertime,’ Sondheim’s ‘Send in the Clowns,’ and another half dozen classic melodies. Aretha was perfectly positioned to play this circuit. The opening was there.”
“Everyone was excited about the idea of Aretha performing with classical symphonies,” said Ruth Bowen. “It was the obvious next move. And it also suited her style. She could become an even greater diva. She could wear fabulous jewels and fabulous furs and gain even greater status. She could go where no other rhythm-and-blues singer had ever gone and conquer a whole new world. What’s more, the audience was affluent, and the fees would be large. And yet I knew it wouldn’t happen—at least not on a grand scale. These dates are locked in long in advance—often more than a year. Aretha doesn’t like to plan that far away. She’s also been known to cancel at the last minute. In the classical world, that’s a no-no. But what ultimately made it unworkable was the fact that Aretha would not be entirely in charge. Maybe it’s true of all of us aging dames, but the older Aretha gets, the greater her fear that she won’t be in charge—and the greater her need that she has to be in charge.”
There was, in fact, a period when Aretha discussed a new paradigm of performing. Vaughn and Ruth Bowen weren’t entirely wrong that her controlling nature interfered with the plans. But it was more than that; it was the success of “A Rose Is Still a Rose” that convinced Aretha that she could compete with the Janet Jacksons and the Madonnas. She spoke of an even more elaborate self-contained show, with dancers and rappers and a full gospel choir. She vowed to lose at least sixty pounds and realize her dream of not only studying classical piano at Juilliard but getting in shape and performing her own form of ballet.
Aretha proudly gave me a copy of the March 21 issue of Billboard in which statistician Fred Bronson’s article gave her something to smile about:
“‘Rose’ is Franklin’s 96th r&b chart entry, the second-highest total in history (James Brown has 118). It’s also her 52nd top 10 hit. The only artists with more are Brown (58) and Louis Jordan (54).”
In the spring, Aretha kept her visibility high by appearing on VH1’s Divas Live concert in New York that raised more than $750,000 for the network’s campaign to restore school-music programs. An energized Aretha sang “Chain of Fools” with Mariah Carey, and then, with the choir—consisting of Mariah, Carole King, Celine Dion, Gloria Estefan, and Shania Twain—she did “Natural Woman.” Aretha sang the first and last choruses, and although she finally shared the mic, she was adamant on doing the long and extended last vamps alone. Carole King, the song’s composer, failed to get any solo time, but that seemed to be okay with Carole. Long ago, it had become Aretha’s song, and on this night, Aretha was reestablishing that fact.
In May she was back on the cover of Jet. She complained about the lack of offers of movie roles. In other areas, she was upbeat: she’d committed to losing weight; she was thrilled with the success of “Rose” and Divas Live; and she was in love. When asked for specifics, she called him her Mystery Man. “[He’s] a cutie,” said Aretha. “He’s not in the industry. It doesn’t matter what age he is.”
When I read the article to Ruth Bowen at the time, she said, “It doesn’t matter what age he is because he doesn’t exist. If he were real, she’d let us know. She was hardly shy talking about Ted White or Dennis Edwards or Glynn Turman or Willie Wilkerson. Why suddenly is she getting so secretive about naming some man she’s dating? Who is she protecting? Most men would be proud of the fact that they’re dating the Queen of Soul. They’d want the world to know. But, mind you, for a long time now, this was when Aretha started getting strange. In order to have something to say, she just made up shit.”
In June, Time listed her as one of the most influential people of the twentieth century.
In July, Billboard reported the Rose album had sold 292,000 units and the single—“A Rose Is Still a Rose”—had gone gold.
In August, Ebony ran another major profile on Aretha, a puff piece. “These days she is radiant with the glow of love,” the reporter wrote, “but she is reluctant to identify the object of her affection.”
She was not at all hesitant, though, to identify herself once again with the Mrs. Murphy role in Blues Brothers. She revived that character from the original film, this time singing “Respect” in the sequel that starred Dan Aykroyd and John Goodman, who took Belushi’s place.
Her profile remained high and her career news remained positive. But then, at the start of the new year, Aretha suffered a major public relations setback in her hometown that sent her into a rage.