Roberta Flack was the first artist to win the Grammy Award for Record of the Year in two consecutive years: "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" won in 1973 and "Killing Me Softly with His Song" won in 1974.
33 Facts About Roberta Flack
2.
When Roberta Flack was nine, she started taking an interest in playing the piano.
3.
Roberta Flack eventually changed her major from piano to voice and became an assistant conductor of the university choir.
4.
Roberta Flack became a student teacher at a school near Chevy Chase, Maryland.
5.
Roberta Flack graduated from Howard University at 19 and began graduate studies in music, but the sudden death of her father forced her to take a job teaching music and English in Farmville, North Carolina.
6.
Roberta Flack taught private piano lessons out of her home on Euclid Street, NW in the city.
7.
Roberta Flack began singing professionally after being hired to perform regularly at Mr Henry's Restaurant which was on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, in 1968.
8.
Les McCann discovered Roberta Flack singing and playing jazz in a DC nightclub.
9.
The film was digitally reissued on DVD and CD in 2004 but Roberta Flack declined permission for her image and recording to be included for unknown reasons.
10.
Roberta Flack's cover version of "Will You Love Me Tomorrow" hit number 76 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1972.
11.
In 1972, Roberta Flack began recording regularly with Donny Hathaway, scoring hits such as the Grammy-winning "Where Is the Love" and later "The Closer I Get to You", both million-selling gold singles.
12.
On her own Roberta Flack scored her second No 1 hit in 1973, "Killing Me Softly with His Song" written by Charles Fox, Norman Gimbel and Lori Lieberman.
13.
In 1974, Roberta Flack released "Feel Like Makin' Love," which became her third and final No 1 hit to date on the Hot 100; she produced the single and her 1975 album of the same name under the pseudonym Rubina Flake.
14.
In 1974, Roberta Flack sang the lead on a Sherman Brothers song called "Freedom", which featured prominently at the opening and closing of the movie Huckleberry Finn.
15.
Roberta Flack had a 1982 hit single with "Making Love", written by Burt Bacharach, which reached No 13.
16.
In 1986, Roberta Flack sang the theme song entitled "Together Through the Years" for the NBC television series Valerie, later known as The Hogan Family.
17.
In 1987, Roberta Flack supplied the voice of Michael Jackson's mother in the 18-minute short film for "Bad".
18.
Roberta Flack found herself again in the US Top 10 with the hit song "Set the Night to Music", a 1991 duet with Jamaican vocalist Maxi Priest that peaked at No 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts and No 2 AC.
19.
In 1999, a star with Roberta Flack's name was placed on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
20.
In February 2012, Flack released Let it Be Roberta, an album of Beatles covers including "Hey Jude" and "Let It Be".
21.
Roberta Flack knew John Lennon and Yoko Ono, as both households moved in 1975 into The Dakota apartment building in New York City; they had apartments across the hall from each other.
22.
Roberta Flack has said that she has been asked to do a second album of Beatles covers.
23.
At age 80, Flack made her most recent recording, Running, the closing credits song of the 2018 feature documentary 3100: Run and Become with music and lyrics by Michael A Levine.
24.
Roberta Flack is a member of the Artist Empowerment Coalition, which advocates for artists to have the right to control their creative properties.
25.
Roberta Flack is a spokeswoman for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals; her appearance in commercials for the ASPCA featured "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face".
26.
Roberta Flack is the aunt of professional ice skater Rory Roberta Flack.
27.
Roberta Flack is the godmother of musician Bernard Wright, who died in an accident on May 19,2022.
28.
Roberta Flack became ill, left the stage, and was rushed to the Harlem Hospital Center.
29.
On November 14,2022, it was announced by a spokesperson that Roberta Flack had been diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and had retired from performing, due to the disease making it "impossible to sing", according to a spokesperson.
30.
Roberta Flack is a favorite singer of Vic Wilcox, in David Lodge's novel Nice Work, winner of the Sunday Express Book of the Year award in 1988.
31.
On May 11,2017, Roberta Flack received an honorary Doctorate degree in the Arts from Long Island University.
32.
Roberta Flack was inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame in 2009.
33.
On March 12,2022, Roberta Flack was honored with the DAR Women in American History Award and a restored fire callbox in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Washington DC commemorating her early-career connection to nearby Mr Henry's neighborhood bar.