A Sweet Voice Stilled

Whitney Houston, a songstress born to one of the most talented families on American music, died Saturday in Beverly Hills, Calif. She was 48.

Houston, whose career included numerous gold records, a starring role in an iconic dramatic musical, numerous Grammy Awards, Emmys and American Music Awards had a troubled past marred by drugs, volatile relationships and suspected domestic violence.

The daughter of 70s R&B artist, Cissy Houston, who later became a top Gospel performer, Whitney Houston was also the cousin of Dionne Warwick and her late sister, Dee Dee, and the goddaughter of Aretha Franklin.

Formerly married to Bobby Brown, she self-parodied her life in a reality television show entitled "Being Bobby Brown" in 2005. 

The cause of death and the details of her final days will be investigated by police and reported for days to come.

Hours after her death, legendary music producer, Clive Davis, hosted his annual pre-Grammy  party, at which Houston had been expected to perform.

"Whitney would have wanted the music to go on, and her family asked that we carry on," Davis told his guests.

Alicia Keys, Sean Combs, Tony Bennett, the Kinks and others honored the singer's memory with words and songs.

For now, I choose to remember a world class talent. Like so many great artists, she has gone before her time. The flaws of her life and her personal demons do not diminish her talent.





Whitney Houston made music, her songs brought joy and made many little girls, grown women and sweet men want to hit and hold high notes.  Like Billie Holiday, Van Morrison, Mama Cass, Jimi Hendrix, John Belushi, Richard Pryor and Kurt Cobain, remember her for her art, and not her final act.

Pop Goes the Half Time

At 53, Madonna pranced on stage and with multiple costumes and a medley that included segments of 30 years of hits, she pulled off an adequate and safe performance at Super Bowl XLVI.

She promised no wardrobe malfunctions and without a doubt there were no surprises and no more excitement than you might find in an old Busby Berkley musical.

The Material Girl provided some familiar lip synch moves, but this was not a show that warranted many "oh wows!"

There was little to illustrate why she once was a favorite artist on MTV and why songs titled "Like a Virgin," of "Like a Prayer" once aroused controversy among some and passions among others. The lyrics were the same, but the moves were purely rated "G."


She has not aged like Cher, who is now 65, and put her sexiness side by side with Christina Aguilera just last year. While Cher has toned down her look over the years, what she provides is show biz, that like the late Mae West, is classically her own.

Madonna was not Tina Turner at 69, as this picture, taken three years ago, will indicate. Turner is a diva whose moves, curves and voice have all endured maintaining the essence of great beauty worthy of her past sexiness.

 The globe-trotting material girl did not make any moves she would not want her children or even the pope's children to see. Instead, she moved around the stage, going from a black and gold look reminiscent of 1995's New Orlean's Saints Cheerleaders, and ending up draped in Gothic lame' and taffeta.

The Super Bowl Half Time Show has gone for safe entertainment since Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction during the half time performance at Super Bowl XXXVIII.

To be sure, Madonna at 53, is not Janet Jackson at 45. But half-time show producers apparently chose to go with a name, the promise of tame and a safe show for Super Bowl XLVI.

Madonna danced, moved and smiled through the requisite 15 minute set. While the songs were once hits, the overall performance was simply a staged production that screamed out "Glee."


 

Don Knew the Difference

People forget that Soul Train started in Chicago.  It was a city that could support a weekly music show intended for a black audience. It was also a city packed with talent. There were writers, producers, musicians and talented vocalists living there, hanging out and turning out music in phenomenal amounts.

The first guests Don Cornelius had on his show were Jerry Butler, the Chi-lites and the Emotions. A backup group led by a young musician named Maurice White would ultimately evolve into Earth, Wind and Fire.

When it came to music, Don Cornelius knew the difference. While disc jockeys across the country called it R&B, short for rhythm and blues, and most people referred to it as Soul Music, Don Cornelius knew that every city had a style and a sound.

That helped him make Soul Train different from a host of local shows created at the time that never quite caught on, locally and never really had a shot at syndication.  Chicago's Dells were not Cleveland's O'Jays, and Philadelphia's Intruders were not Cincinnati's Isley Brothers.

Don exposed two generations of young people to the sound tracks of their lives. The show provided an escape from chores, Saturday jobs and the stifling sameness of the neighborhoods many of us never left until we headed off for college or the military.

Gut-bucket Blues singers like Joe Simon and Johnny Taylor appeared on the show and sang songs that made their music urban enough to make national charts. Household names like the Temptations and the Four Tops checked their Las Vegas acts at the door and "came home to play just for folks."

Marvin Gaye sang songs, and sometimes even played basketball in outfits that him and Don wore that today's kids would say just looked "young."

When you had to have a huge hit to get any national exposure, Soul Train's syndicated success brought acts into markets from New York and Miami to San Diego and Seattle. The show was never on everywhere, but if you were black and ran into anyone else who was, you could talk about it anywhere.

I doubt that I know anyone who came of age between 1965 and 2005 who never tried to make a fashion statement with something they saw on Soul Train. From Apple Hats to Flagg Brother's boots, or those suspendered hotpants and the ever present Afro picks Soul Train helped define America's vision of black youth having fun.

If you grew up watching fuzzy images on Mississippi televisions from stations in New Orleans, or searched for signals in the rec lounge of some dormitory of some rural college campus on Saturday, Soul Train was not something you wanted to miss.




I could have written about politics, or the economy or this weekend's Superbowl tonight, but February 1, 2012 belongs to Don Cornelius. He knew the difference when it came to music, but he also knew what made us more alike. His idea and his legacy helped define what it meant to be into Black culture for more than 30 years. We will miss him.