美国国家公共电台 NPR At Aretha Franklin's Funeral, Gospel Was The Heart — And Backbone

 

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

We are going to end this program where we started it - by remembering a towering figure from American life. On Friday, the Greater Grace Temple in Detroit embodied¹ the spirit, the fierceness and the joy of Aretha Franklin. Thousands attended the seven-plus-hour funeral that featured family, friends, civil rights activists², preachers and a former president who celebrated³ Franklin's legacy⁴ by offering personal stories and prayer. And as NPR's Anastasia Tsioulcas reports, the undercurrent to it all was music.

ANASTASIA TSIOULCAS, BYLINE⁵: All kinds of musicians were at Detroit's Greater Grace Temple to pay tribute to a legend and the raw power of her music. Some other performers counted Aretha Franklin as a friend and colleague for many decades, like Stevie Wonder.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

STEVIE WONDER: (Singing) 'Cause I'll be loving you always, always, always, always.

TSIOULCAS: Smokey Robinson and Franklin grew up around the corner from each other.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

SMOKEY ROBINSON: So now my longest friend has gone home.

TSIOULCAS: Robinson sang "Really Gonna Miss You" cappella, his voice sweetly piping out alone across the hushed church.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

ROBINSON: (Singing) Really going to miss you. It's really going to be different without you. For the rest of my life, going to be thinking about you.

ROBINSON: Other performers came to know Aretha Franklin much more recently. Singer Jennifer Hudson was reportedly handpicked by Franklin to play her in an upcoming biopic. At the funeral, Hudson blazed through the song "Amazing Grace."

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

JENNIFER HUDSON: (Singing) Aretha said, it was your grace that brought me through.

TSIOULCAS: And gospel music was the backbone⁶ and the heart of Aretha Franklin's homegoing service. Franklin made her first recordings⁷ at age 14 in her father's church in Detroit. And there were gospel inflections in everything she sang, as one of the speakers, the Reverend Dr. William Barber, pointed⁸ out.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

WILLIAM BARBER: In Aretha, the holiness of the sacred and the secular⁹ came together in a way that could only be ordered by the Lord. Some say that even as the world spins, there is a certain tune¹⁰ to the world's orbit. Aretha tapped into that tone and taught us its rhythm.

TSIOULCAS: Some performers directly reflected that lifelong history that Aretha Franklin had with gospel. Franklin once filled in for Shirley Caesar when she was just 16 years old. At Friday's service, Caesar sang with a more up-and-coming gospel artist, Tasha Cobbs Leonard.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

SHIRLEY CAESAR: (Singing) How I got over.

TASHA COBBS LEONARD: (Singing) How I got over.

TSIOULCAS: Funk singer Chaka Khan built on that foundation when she spun¹¹ out the gospel tune "Goin' Up Yonder" at the service.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

CHAKA KHAN: (Singing) I'm going up yonder, going up yonder, going up yonder.

TSIOULCAS: At the funeral, speaker after speaker pointed out that Aretha Franklin's legacy as an artist is inseparable from her work as an often under sung hero of the civil rights movement, work that so often began in churches. Author Michael Eric Dyson said that her advocacy and support stretched over decades.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

MICHAEL ERIC DYSON: She was about getting Angela Davis out of jail. She was about working with Martin Luther King Jr. and Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. She was about transforming the existence of black America.

TSIOULCAS: Aretha Franklin helped transform her community, and through her music, she moved a much larger world. Anastasia Tsioulcas, NPR News, Detroit.

1 embodied   

v.表现( embody的过去式和过去分词 )；象征；包括；包含

参考例句：

• a politician who embodied the hopes of black youth 代表黑人青年希望的政治家
• The heroic deeds of him embodied the glorious tradition of the troops. 他的英雄事迹体现了军队的光荣传统。 来自《简明英汉词典》

2 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 celebrated   

adj.有名的，声誉卓著的

参考例句：

• He was soon one of the most celebrated young painters in England.不久他就成了英格兰最负盛名的年轻画家之一。
• The celebrated violinist was mobbed by the audience.观众团团围住了这位著名的小提琴演奏家。

4 legacy   

n.遗产，遗赠；先人(或过去)留下的东西

参考例句：

• They are the most precious cultural legacy our forefathers left.它们是我们祖先留下来的最宝贵的文化遗产。
• He thinks the legacy is a gift from the Gods.他认为这笔遗产是天赐之物。

5 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

6 backbone   

n.脊骨，脊柱，骨干；刚毅，骨气

参考例句：

• The Chinese people have backbone.中国人民有骨气。
• The backbone is an articulate structure.脊椎骨是一种关节相连的结构。

7 recordings   

n.记录( recording的名词复数 )；录音；录像；唱片

参考例句：

• a boxed set of original recordings 一套盒装原声录音带
• old jazz recordings reissued on CD 以激光唱片重新发行的老爵士乐

8 pointed   

adj.尖的，直截了当的

参考例句：

• He gave me a very sharp pointed pencil.他给我一支削得非常尖的铅笔。
• She wished to show Mrs.John Dashwood by this pointed invitation to her brother.她想通过对达茨伍德夫人提出直截了当的邀请向她的哥哥表示出来。

9 secular   

n.牧师，凡人；adj.世俗的，现世的，不朽的

参考例句：

• We live in an increasingly secular society.我们生活在一个日益非宗教的社会。
• Britain is a plural society in which the secular predominates.英国是个世俗主导的多元社会。

10 tune   

n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整

参考例句：

• He'd written a tune,and played it to us on the piano.他写了一段曲子，并在钢琴上弹给我们听。
• The boy beat out a tune on a tin can.那男孩在易拉罐上敲出一首曲子。

11 spun   

v.纺，杜撰，急转身

参考例句：

• His grandmother spun him a yarn at the fire.他奶奶在火炉边给他讲故事。
• Her skilful fingers spun the wool out to a fine thread.她那灵巧的手指把羊毛纺成了细毛线。