Her singing was substandard and I didn’t like her hat… but I wasn’t offended by Aretha at all.
Her entire performance - from the singing to the hat - was way over the top . . . which is exactly what the occasion called for. The whole day was over the top (except for that godawful poem), and Aretha was just being Aretha. That’s what she was there for.
Y’all ever been to a black church on Sunday morning? Aretha’s hat was positively subdued. 
Oh god…the fucking poem. What the hell was that all about?
My kids watched some of the inaguration at school and I asked them what they thought of Aretha Franklin.
“Who?”
“The lady with the hat.”
“Oh.” The hat they instantly remember. It was unforgettable. “She was…okay.”
I went on to explain that Aretha is a hometown girl whose voice is known the world over and that they did not see her at her finest because of age and it was so cold. You don’t diss Aretha. her hat, yes. Her bosoms, yes, but not the voice.
Thanks to youtube, I pulled up some of her greatest examples of why we all love Aretha and how eveyr generation or so there is one voice, just one amazing voice that makes its mark and shows us the true defination of pure talent . and is not a product like Britney or Miley.
My children, glazed over from my exulations of music and being a homer, were still meh.
And then I sold them to medical research.
It wasn’t really the melisma for me, it was just her voice. I haven’t heard her perform lately, but when I heard the song on the TV, I thought to myself “who the fuck is butchering that song?” To my surprise, it was Aretha. It sounded surprisingly thin and hollow. Then trying to pull off that melisma with that sort of voice? Not a very good performance. I have no problem with her doing the song, I’m just shocked at where her voice went. I suppose, after all these years, I shouldn’t be surprised. But I hadn’t heard her recently.
:rolleyes: We weren’t offended because we’re white or uptight. We didn’t like it because she did a crappy job. I am so tired of this notion that there is some racial component to whether or not we like black singers. As though we haven’t been listening to black musicians our entire lives. :rolleyes:
Her voice was thin, and her timing was off. She tried too hard to put stylistic flourishes that just didn’t work.
She sucked.
It isn’t racial at all. I’ve heard gospel singers do amazing jobs. She just didn’t.
Also, King’s quote was about people singing along. All her gymnastics made it impossible to sing along. It became all about her, and not about the moment.
Exactly.
I have no problem with a singer “making a song their own” (though, for the record, Sinatra’s particular method of doing so always bugs the hell out of me). Aretha is welcome to jazz up, scat, rap, croon, or cadenza “America” to her heart’s content. That doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll enjoy what she comes up with. Particularly when her voice is simply no longer up to the demands of the task.
I heard an NPR announcer praising the way Aretha took a “white bread” song and put some “soul” into it (don’t recall his exact words). Only later did I hear the playback of the performance and my instantaneous reaction was “Holy shit that sounds awful.”
The song doesn’t lend itself to “personal interpretation” like other songs do, but on the other hand, why would anyone want to hear Aretha sing anything straight? They could have asked someone else to sing it if all they wanted was the standard version.
True. But it’s not the interpretation that grated on me. It was the voice. It just sounded thin and off to me. I even said to my girlfriend, “Wow, she’s really lost her voice” after realizing who it was singing.
I hate ALL melisma. It makes me gag. It’s my biggest complaint about American Idol. It ruins songs. RUINS them. ALL of them.
Loved the hat- thought she carried it off. I did think that she has lost weight- I could have sworn she looked twice as big the last time I saw her in a formal gown (bosoms like the continental shelf).
But that was not the voice of the Aretha I love, and it was disappointing. We sang “Respect” over her instead.
My best friend at work is this short little chubby black girl with all the attitude in the world. I absolutely love her.
Anyway she walks into work this morning and I start in about how awful Aretha was. She turns around and looks at me and gives me “THE LOOK” I knew I was in trouble (our boss did too as he immediately left the room).
She point directly in my face and says…
“YOU WILL NOT TALK BAD ABOUT ARETHA IN MY PRESENCE!”
I say “Well what about the hat?”
She gives me the palm and walks out of the office.
She didn’t talk to me all day long.
Well, at least some good came of it then. Hopefully they’ll be used to find a cure for something.
By the way, if a singer cares for their voice, there is little reason for age to diminish it that much. Opera singers can have long careers, but then most of them are obsessive about caring for their voices. Nope, I suspect her vocal damage is self-inflicted.
Yup, I agree.
I can’t say it any better. So I repeat: Yup, I agree.
Melisma can be glo-o-o-o-o-o, o-o-o-o-o, o-o-o-o-o-rious.
American singers need to take a lesson from the Welsh.
Sing on pitch, god damn it all. And stop breathing in the middle of words. Or in the middle of sentences. It sounds awful. Seriously. I don’t care if you’re the Queen of Soul, the King of Pop, or the Chief of Corndogs. (yay, melisma and friends, among other things…) And PLEASE, for the love of all that is holy, stop adding ornamentation where none exist. Seriously. It sounds like crap.
DRIVES. ME. BATTY.
Vocal Yngwie-ism FTL.