Roberta Flack, singer of Killing Me Softly With His Song, dies at 88

R&B singer Roberta Flack died Monday, February 24 at the age of 88, her team reported in a statement relayed by Variety . "We are heartbroken to learn that the glorious Roberta Flack passed away this morning. She died peacefully surrounded by her family. Roberta broke boundaries and records. She was also a proud educator," it reads. The American artist was particularly known for her title The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face, which won the Grammy Awards for song of the year in 1973, featured on the soundtrack of the Clint Eastwood film A Chill in the Night.

Born on February 10, 1937, into a musical family in Black Mountain, North Carolina, Roberta Flack was inspired from a young age by the gospel music of Mahalia Jackson and Sam Cooke. She began playing the piano at the age of 9 and enrolled in Harvard in a music program at only 15, thanks to her exceptional academic results, being gifted. While leading her own band and playing the organ at church, Roberta Flack attended a music school in Chevy Chase, Maryland. She then became an English and music teacher before devoting herself to her career as an artist. She began to make a name for herself in the 1970s with the release of her album Killing Me Softly , which won the Grammy Award for Best Album of the Year in 1974.

In the 1980s, Roberta Flack began writing film songs and reconnected with Clint Eastwood for whom she recorded This Side of Forever heard in Dirty Harry Returns . Her title Maybe appears on the soundtrack of Romantic Comedy. The singer continued to release records until 2012, including Born To Love, Oasis, Set The Night To Music and Stop the World. But the New York Times revealed in November 2022 that she suffered from Lou Gehrig's disease and could no longer sing.