Her epochal reading of “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face,” a composition by British folk singer Ewan MacColl, transforms the original’s tender devotions into an evocation of love so fixed and immutable it causes the firmament itself to tremble. A tremulous Donny Hathaway/Robert Ayers collaboration, “Our Ages or Our Hearts,” and an inspired slow-burning take on the traditional “I Told Jesus” round out Side One in bravura fashion, ably setting the stage for the album’s astonishing back half.īeginning with a definitive take on Leonard Cohen’s “Hey, That’s No Way to Say Goodbye”-a track that belongs on any short list in the competitive category of finest-ever Cohen covers-Flack raises the spiritual, romantic, and political stakes to towering levels on Side Two, ultimately rendering a song cycle which acts as both a spiritual cousin and equal to Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks, released the previous year. Flack’s interpretation-entirely in Spanish-is profoundly moving on its own merits and the more so for connecting inequities between two cultures over generations. The elegiac second track “Angelitos Negros” is borrowed from the soundtrack of the 1948 Mexican social-realist film by the same name, which addresses the prohibition of interracial relationships. Henry’s.Īn opening rip through the Gene McDaniels-penned standard “Compared to What,” with its stabbing horns and unyielding groove, anticipates both Marvin Gaye’s socially conscious landmark What’s Going On and Sly and the Family Stone’s negative-vibe masterpiece of a rejoinder There’s a Riot Goin’ On by two years. Her extraordinary backing band, consisting of stalwarts Bucky Pizzarelli on guitar, Ron Carter on bass, Ray Lucas on drums, and other heavy hitters gelled with seamless immediacy, as Flack lead them through a repertoire of brilliantly chosen soul and folk material she had spent countless hours perfecting at Mr. When visiting jazz legend Les McCann was dragged along by friends to see Flack perform one night, he immediately provided his most forceful recommendation to Atlantic, and soon after she was signed.įlack’s debut, First Take, was recorded over a period of 10 hours at Atlantic Studios in New York, in February 1969. She spent some wilderness years teaching high school, but word of mouth spread, and soon enough they came to her. But Roberta Flack wasn’t your average gifted aspirant. wasn’t a center of the music industry like Los Angeles or Nashville-places where gifted aspirants went to be discovered. Her talent was otherworldly: The Black Mountain, North Carolina-born pianist and singer was admitted to Howard University’s top-flight music program at the age of 15, possessing prodigious jazz and classical chops and a voice splitting the difference between Sarah Vaughan’s elegant alto and Etta James’ deep-blue expressiveness. No artist working in the moment was doing a finer job of chronicling those tenuous, terrifying, revolutionary times. Those coming to hear someone make sense of the chaos chose astutely. Flack continued performing her sets, lines forming around the block. Following the April 4 assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., riots broke out in several cities, including the District. All around, the world was diligently unraveling. Henry’s in Washington, D.C., an unfancy but inimitably hip jazz club located at the corner of 6th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, playing three nights a week to rhapsodic audiences. Throughout most of the eventful year of 1968, the soon-to-be-famous Roberta Flack was ensconced in a residency at Mr.
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