ARETHA FRANKLIN, QUEEN OF SOUL IS VERY ILL

 

According to a report from Showbiz 411, Aretha Franklin, Queen of Soul is currently ‘gravely ill’ and surrounded by her family in Detroit.

Aretha Franklin, who was diagnosed with cancer in 2010, turned 76 in March. Her last performance was on November 2, 2017, for the Elton JohnAID Foundation in New York and her public performance occurred at the Philadelphia’s Mann Center last August.

She has struggled with weight issues throughout her life, battled alcoholism and was a chain smoker for a large part of it.

Rolling Stone once named Franklin the number 1 singer of all time. The American singer and songwriter began her career as a child singing gospel music at the New Bethel Baptist Church in Detroit, where her father was a minister. In 1960, Franklin was signed to Columbia Records where she only achieved modest success.

It wasn’t until she signed with Atlantic Records in 1967 that she achieved commercial success with songs like “Respect,” “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman,” and “Think. By the end of the 1960s, she had become known as the “Queen of Soul.”