Aretha Franklin

Pictures

PNG

Listen to, buy or share

Buy

Tags

Everyone’s tags

More tags

Biography

Detroit, United States (1956 – present)

Aretha Franklin (March 25, 1942) is a Memphis, Tennessee-born but Detroit, Michigan-raised American iconic gospel, soul, and R&B singer. Many have called her “The Queen Of Soul” and “Lady Soul”. She is renowned for her soul and R&B recordings but is also adept at jazz, rock, blues, pop, and gospel. She is generally regarded as one of the best vocalists ever by such industry publications/media outlets as Rolling Stone and VH1, due to her phenomenal technical and interpretative talents.

Adept at the piano as well as having a gifted voice, Franklin became a child prodigy. By the age of fourteen, she signed a record deal with Battle Records, where her father Reverend C.L. Franklin recorded his sermons and gospel vocal recordings, and she issued Songs of Faith in 1956.

She is the second most honored female popular singer in Grammy history (after Alison Krauss), having won eighteen competitive Grammys (including an unprecedented eleven for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance, eight of them consecutive). The state of Michigan has declared her voice to be a natural wonder.

Franklin is perhaps best-known for her interpretation of Otis Redding’s Respect, recorded in 1967 with sisters Carolyn Franklin and Erma Franklin. Many of her songs, however, were originals that have since been covered by other artists. Some of her best-known compositions include (Sweet Sweet Baby) Since You’ve Been Gone, Ain’t No Way, All The King’s Horses, Baby, Baby, Baby, Call Me, Dr. Feelgood, Rock Steady, Spirit In The Dark, and Think (which she performed in the film The Blues Brothers).

Videos

Top Albums

Listening Trend

1,339,445listeners all time
16,689,519scrobbles all time
#422 in last week’s chart
Recent listeners trend:

Start scrobbling and track your listening history

Last.fm users scrobble the music they play in iTunes, Spotify, Rdio and over 200 other music players.

Create a Last.fm profile

Shoutbox

Leave a comment. Log in to Last.fm or sign up.

Listening Now

Top Listeners

Email Newsletter

Universal Music Group Get exclusive tour, release & promotion updates on Aretha Franklin from Universal Music.