Aretha Franklin Sings The Great Diva Classics album comes SO close to being an Aretha Franklin classic but, in the end, falls short.
That doesn’t mean that the album doesn’t have points of brilliance. At 72, Franklin can still sing well beyond the vast majority of artists who are currently embracing the “diva” label. As a matter of fact, eight out of the ten tracks on the album are glorious covers of diva classics.
The album starts with At Last and the same lush string arrangement that opened the Etta James version. Even for the first few bars, it’s Franklin sticking close to the James original but, soon, Aretha moves out of the cover zone and, as they love to say, “makes it her own.”
For the next seven cuts, Franklin adds her special touch to a series of well known tunes, sometimes mixing songs. A glorious version of Adele’s Rolling in the Deep morphs into Ain’t No Mountain High Enough, Chaka Khan’s (and Whitney Houston’s) I’m Every Woman moves deftly into Aretha’s own Respect, and, in an unbilled “appearance”, Gloria Gaynor’s anthem I Will Survive suddenly breaks into Destiny Child’s Survivor (fulfilling the lack of Beyonce that was criticized by some parties).
Franklin’s take on Barbra Streisand’s People may not be the stuff that will impress Broadway fans, but it is a glorious take on a song that most would dare not touch.
Maybe the biggest surprise comes in a reggae take on Alisha Key’s No One. What sounds like a possible disaster comes off as if the song was written for the style.
Unfortunately, it all comes crashing down with You Keep Me Hangin’ On. The cut is given a disco arrangement that sounds like it came from the Ethel Merman disco album and Franklin sounds like she couldn’t care less about singing the song.
The album ends with another mistake, an uptempo jazz arrangement of Prince / Sinead O’Connor’s Nothing Compares 2 U. Franklin is more than up to the jazz singing, including some excellent improvisation, but the song itself just does not lend itself to the style. Aretha would have been so much better off if she had taken a true jazz classic and put her mark on it.
Overall, Aretha Franklin Sings the Great Diva Classics is an almost great album that falls short on cuts nine and ten. Simply program the first eight tracks and then move on.
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