Silent blazing: The soul -legend Roberta Flack is dead – an obituary

The soul singer Roberta Flack died. She was a diva with a heart for ballads and roots in the tradition of protest song. Her secret was a blazing in the voice that never broke out to fire.

When the world remembers Roberta Flack, which died on Monday, you will play on the radio “Killing Me Softly”, “Feel Like Making Love” or your version of “The First Time I Ever Saw Your Face”. All of the soul ballads with an effect that the Americans call “Baby Making Music”. Roberta Flack had one of these American voices that were trained in a church choir and therefore had a fervor that is also right in secular soul. And because she not only had the voice, but also the piano playing and the song letter dominated, she became a formative figure of this music.