She demanded R-E-S-P-E-C-T for herself and others. Her music was the soundtrack of a movement. Aretha Franklin died three years ago today.
This is her story.
This is her story.
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MusicTranscript
00:00Everyone wants respect. Everyone needs respect.
00:03♪♪
00:08♪♪
00:20Music is my thing. That's who I am.
00:22I'm in it for the long run, so I'll be around singing
00:28what you want. Baby, I got it.
00:32♪♪
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00:52♪♪
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01:06I don't know how many people can say, as she could,
01:09that she could go downstairs and you've got Dr. Martin Luther
01:12King sitting in the living room talking with her dad,
01:15all these different artists.
01:17♪♪
01:29I know she had a love for, like, all genres of music,
01:33and she never thought she could learn enough.
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01:46♪♪
01:58Gee, we'll always be and is one of the greatest
02:01representations of Black culture, Black church,
02:06Black women, women, just everyone overall.
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02:34Think about what you're trying to do to me.
02:36I mean, that line just resonates in terms of feminism
02:39and the whole respect and how women want to be treated.
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03:41It was kind of, as you say, a woman's anthem,
03:44a battle cry, a mantra.
03:48When Aretha first told us what R-S-P-E-C-T meant to her...
03:55laughter
03:59...she had no idea it would become a rallying cry
04:02for African Americans and women.
04:05And then everyone who felt marginalized
04:07because of what they looked like or who they loved,
04:09they wanted some respect.
04:39♪♪
04:44I'm not really in a great hurry to get back on the plane,
04:48so much more convenient than the way I travel,
04:51but the way I travel is fun, it's custom,
04:54and we have big fun.
04:56♪♪
05:21♪♪
05:29What are you going to be studying?
05:31Classical piano one.
05:32Really? Uh-huh.
05:33Can you imagine how intimidated those freshmen are going to be?
05:36No!
05:37♪♪
05:45When Aretha Franklin first walked in the famed studio in 1967,
05:51most of the other musicians had never heard her sing live before.
05:56When they did, one of them said,
05:58the floors rumbled and the walls shook.
06:02My brain shook.
06:04It was magic.
06:06♪♪
06:19If you track that she went from the Jim Crow days
06:23to singing at the inauguration of the first black president,
06:27Aretha Franklin's music and life
06:30showed the growth and empowerment of blacks in America.
06:34She was our soundtrack.
06:36♪♪
07:03That's our queen.
07:04And particularly with the black community, we lost our queen.
07:08She transcended art.
07:09She transcended music.
07:10She was the embodiment of the black movement in the 1960s.
07:15She was the embodiment of female empowerment in the 1960s.
07:18♪♪
07:30She was the queen of soul.
07:33She was serious about her, like, y'all need to know I'm the queen of soul.
07:36Yes, ma'am, I'm aware you're the queen.
07:37And that's what got me through having her encouragement
07:40and knowing that I had her blessing
07:42to be able to do such a massive project.
07:45Our responsibility in this whole thing.
07:50♪♪
07:58That's the thing with Aretha, like, she was universal.
08:01You know, she's universal and she's timeless to all of us,
08:04no matter the culture, the sex, the time, the race.
08:08It's just, she's timeless.