“Hello, Ms. Kelli,” the familiar, sweet voice came out of my cellphone.
I froze for a moment, the hairs on my arms standing up and my throat suddenly felt like sandpaper.
“Hello, Ms. Franklin,” I replied.
It was July 22, 2015, just two weeks before Aretha Franklin, the undisputed Queen of Soul, would perform one of her very last shows in Southern California as she headlined Microsoft Theater in downtown Los Angeles on Aug. 2.
Once I shook my nerves away and grabbed a quick drink of water, the interview got underway. We dug right in with talking about her new album, “Aretha Franklin Sings the Great Diva Classics,” on which she covered songs by female artists such as Etta James, Alicia Keys and Adele.
She said that there were new artists that excited her and inspired her and to prove it she randomly started singing Adele’s hit “Someone Like You.”
I got the chills. My stomach was suddenly doing flips and my eyes filled with tears. The Queen of Soul was singing to me? She didn’t need a moment to clear her throat or to prepare for it, she just belted it out.
We talked about how “Respect” had stood the test of time, something she said the producer Jerry Wexler was very certain about after he heard Franklin sing it. She talked about being on the charts during the peak of the civil rights movement and that “there are so many people who just want P-E-A-C-E,” she spelled out clearly.
As the interview came to an end, Franklin did what hardly any artists do, she asked me about myself. I told her that I grew up a military kid, that my dad and I watched “The Blues Brothers” a million times and I used to act out her part and sing along to “Think” and that writing was the only thing that ever made sense to me.
She then asked me what I was doing on Aug. 2 and I replied, “Well, that’s my 33rd birthday.”
“Then you’ll be my guest,” she said without pause.
I had already made plans with my boyfriend at the time, but when the Queen of Soul invites you to be her guest, you absolutely bend over backward to change all of your plans and you show up early.
The show was stunning. My co-worker Peter Larsen did a great job of recapping the evening that felt very much like we were at church. Franklin delivered the goods covering Carole King’s “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman” as well as her hits “Think,” “Chain of Fools” and, of course, “Respect.” She hopped on the piano for “If Ever I Would Leave You” and a cover of Simon & Garfunkel’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water.”
After the show, we took our meet-and-greet passes and were led backstage. The small waiting room was filled with lots of familiar faces, from Motown owner Berry Gordy and television producer Shonda Rhimes to actresses Halle Berry and Angela Bassett. While everyone waited to be summoned by the Queen, they noshed on Pink’s Hot Dogs, one of Franklin’s favorite eateries in Los Angeles, which catered the backstage area.
Small groups would go in to another dressing room across the hall and spend one-on-one time with Franklin. When it was our turn, our group lined up behind her backup singers, dancers and the musicians that had performed with her on stage that night. They mostly were hired guns, since Franklin never flew and traveled by bus, she’d hire local talent in the area she was performing in to join her on stage.
We entered the dressing room and were asked to hang out in a waiting area, but we could see Franklin behind a curtain, sitting in her director-style chair with her Pink’s hot dog and chatting away with the crew. One by one those that performed that night were called back behind the curtain. She took the time to talk to and get to know each person and offered a friendly, warm smile and career advice to those who asked for it. She also paid them old school-style, one by one, with bills from a giant roll of cash she pulled from her designer handbag.
Finally, it was my turn. It was a bit like meeting the Wizard of Oz as her assistant moved back the curtain and introduced me. She shook my hand. She had changed from what she had been wearing on stage into something much more comfortable but she still looked like a Queen. My heart was beating like wild and I tried to soak the moment in. For a woman with such a huge voice on stage, she was actually very soft-spoken. She wished me happy birthday and said that she had enjoyed our chat and reading the story I had written about her, adding that she had actually gotten her hands on a physical copy of the newspaper to read it.
The rest is fuzzy. I know I played it cool and professional, even though inside I was melting into a puddle. It was such a special evening and certainly a memorable way to spend my birthday.
