The Queen of Soul Aretha Franklin, who is suffering from pancreatic cancer, has less than a year to live, according to the reports.
The Respect singer, 68, is suffering from an incurable advanced pancreatic cancer, claims a U.S. magazine. aretha franklin died, her family confirmed that she had the disease, but refused to give details or to discuss their prognosis, reports the Sun. Family and friends are “very concerned” but said she’s fine.
It was reported that earlier, aretha franklin died
the American singer of the operation recovered to treat pancreatic cancer, she announced last week that it was canceling all her concerts through May on the advice of their doctor, but did not disclose the cause of their illness.
Newark and Detroit went up in flames in 1967, and no city ever recover. Muhammad Ali, a perfect physical specimen in his absolute prime sports was, of dodging the draft found guilty and stripped of his World Heavyweight Championship. The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. endured a hurricane of criticism when he came out publicly against the war in Vietnam and called on the Government of the United States, “the largest supplier of violence in the world today.”
If you were lucky, you could close the door on the DIN, at least for a little while, and reach for the record with the head and shoulder shot of Aretha at a precarious angle placed on the cover. The album was called “I Never a Man the Way I Love You loved” and if you listened carefully, if you paid attention, it would only inspire you, take you to a place of exquisite human being. A region of laughter and tears. Of love and joyous ways.
I would put the volume higher and higher and higher, and only ride the music: “You’re not good, heartbreaker …” “Do not let me lose this dream …” “Warning …”
You could hear the gospel influence and the blues, as the voice of her, the most talented of the era may have to inform you of the ordinary.
Aretha, now 68, recently operated on and is very ill, reportedly with pancreatic cancer. I said a few days with the Reverend Jesse Jackson, who is very close to the Franklin family in the area. He hesitated to speak in detail, saying only that Aretha is out of the hospital that the operation was “successful” and “recovering nicely.”
For someone with such a wealth of talent and fame and wealth, Aretha has had a very difficult life. Tragedy seemed to stalk her. Her mother, Barbara, an accomplished gospel singer, left the family when Aretha was just 6 and died a few years later. Aretha and her siblings, including an older sister, Erma, and a younger sister, Caroline, both talented musicians have been increased by the terrible CL Franklin, a renowned preacher and close friend of some of the biggest names in black music. (Frequent guests included the budget Gospel Singers Mahalia Jackson and Clara Ward and the remarkable Sam Cooke.)
Reverend Franklin was in the head by someone in his home in 1979, broke and remained in a coma for five years shot up to his death. Carolyn Franklin, who wrote the transcendentally beautiful “Is not No Way” with Aretha, died of cancer in 1988 at the age of 43. Erma Franklin, a singer who is a hit with the song “Piece of My Heart” was (later recorded by Janis Joplin), died in 2002.
Aretha suffered through difficult relationships with men, chronic weight problems and bouts of despair. But always there was the music, the beauty and artistry and grace of Aretha as her best, which was often. As the author Peter Guralnick it this way: “Aretha put a claim on the ecstatic transcendence of the imagination.”
Rolling Stone magazine ranked it No. 1 on their list of the 100 greatest singers of the rock era, calls it “a gift of God.”
My sister Sandy’s 18th Birthday and high school prom happen to fall on the same day in 1967, there was a big party at our house after the prom. One song after another, “I Never Loved a Man” was loud, played again and again, and start all these beautiful young people, their lives over to serious, complicated dance steps did the music. Aretha was an ecstatic presence in the house as safe as if they had been there in person. She was like a sister to every child.
Aretha has had a lifetime of musical success, but it is difficult, both the size and the stunning effect that the album is overrated. Guralnick described it as Aretha almost exploded on the soul scene. In a telephone interview this week, he recalled hearing the title song from the album on a loudspeaker outside a record store in the Roxbury section of Boston. It was a cold day, and strangers moved by this exciting new record were dancing on the sidewalk together. They were excited, like so many others, the music of the great American artist.
Such a toast or prayer for Aretha this season would be great – just a moment of appreciation and the desire that they continue to recover well.
