Singer Roberta Flack, whose signature voice and soulful interpretations of songs such as "Killing Me Softly with His Song" catapulted her to the top of the charts and influenced generations, has died. She was 88.
The legendary singer died on Monday, according to a press release from her representatives provided to ABC News. No cause of death was shared in the statement.
"We are heartbroken that the glorious Roberta Flack passed away this morning February 24, 2025," the statement said. "She died peacefully surrounded by her family. Roberta broke boundaries and records. She was also a proud educator," the statement continued.
Flack was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, otherwise known as ALS, in 2022, which resulted in the loss of her singing voice, her publicists said at the time.
Flack topped the charts in the 1970s with hits including "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face," "Killing Me Softly with His Song," "Feel Like Makin' Love," "Where Is the Love" and "The Closer I Get to You."
The songstress was nominated for 14 Grammy awards, winning five -- including a lifetime achievement award. She was the first artist to win the Grammy Award for record of the year in back-to-back years -- for "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" in 1973 and "Killing Me Softly with His Song" in 1974. The latter would go on to top the charts again three decades later with a cover by the Fugees.
Flack's influence "looms over both R&B and indie 'bedroom' pop," music critic Ann Powers wrote in a 2020 essay, calling Flack a "titan in the eyes of many fellow artists and discerning fans."
"In more than a half-century of making music, she's established herself as one of the most distinctive song stylists in the pop arena," Powers wrote.
MORE: Roberta Flack diagnosed with ALS, says it's 'made it impossible to sing'Flack was born in Black Mountain, North Carolina, into a musical family; her mother was a church organist and her father a self-taught jazz pianist. A prodigy on the piano, she won a full music scholarship to Howard University, which she started attending at the age of 15. It was there that she would meet her close friend and collaborator, the late Donny Hathaway.
Her initial goal wasn't to be a superstar songstress, but a classical concert pianist.
"My real ambition was to be a concert pianist and to play Schumann and Bach and Chopin -- the Romantics. Those were my guys," Flack told NPR in 2012.
Flack taught in schools for several years before being discovered by Les McCann while performing jazz in a Washington, D.C., nightclub, who helped get her an audition with her first label, Atlantic Records.
Several years after signing with Atlantic, Clint Eastwood chose "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" from her 1969 debut album for the soundtrack to his 1971 film, "Play Misty For Me" -- bringing Flack to a more mainstream audience. "Killing Me Softly" helped cement her as a star.
"It was unexpected and breathtaking," Flack wrote in an email to The Guardian in a 2020 profile. "The transition from my life in Washington as a teacher into this kind of attention was surreal."
During the 1970s, Flack recorded duets regularly with Hathaway -- including the hits "Where Is the Love" and "The Closer I Get to You" -- until his death in 1979.
In the 1980s, she began working with Peabo Bryson, including on the hit single "Tonight, I Celebrate My Love," and also had a hit duet with Maxi Priest with "Set the Night to Music." On TV, she sang "Together Through the Years," the theme song to the show "Valerie," later known as "The Hogan Family," which ran for six seasons.
Later in her career, she released "Let It Be Roberta," a collection of Beatles covers, in 2012. Her last album, "Running," was released in 2018. She retired from touring that same year.
In 2020, she received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Among other accolades, Berklee College of Music awarded her an honorary doctor of music degree in May 2023.
Her legacy extends beyond her music. In 2010, she founded the Roberta Flack Foundation, which supports music education. She was also a spokesperson for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, with her song "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" featured in a commercial for the organization.
A longtime goal, Flack released a children's book, "The Green Piano: How Little Me Found Music," in 2023, written with Tonya Bolden, that paid homage to her musical start: as a child, she practiced on an old upright piano her father had found in a junkyard and painted green for her. In her author's note, Flack urges readers: "Find your own 'green piano' and practice relentlessly until you find your voice, and a way to put that beautiful music into the world."
The documentary, "American Masters: Roberta Flack," released on PBS in January 2023, celebrated the music industry icon.
"She understands an artist can offer us a voice when we can't find our own, capturing thoughts and a range of emotions through her singing and her piano," Antonino D'Ambrosio, the film's director, wrote in an essay on the documentary.
In her own words, Flack said she wanted to always be true to herself.
"I didn't try to be a soul singer, a jazz singer, a blues singer -- no category," Flack wrote to The Guardian. "My music is my expression of what I feel and believe in a moment."
Flack was married to jazz musician Steve Novosel from 1966 to 1972. She was the godmother of musician Bernard Wright, who died in May 2022.
Her niece is retired professional ice skater Rory Flack.
