Aretha Franklin (52 page)

Positively the most hysterical bit of press that Aretha Franklin received in 1998 came in December, when
The Detroit Free Press
announced that All-Star Limousine service of Royal Oak, Michigan, was suing her for the non-payment of $3,651.88 in provided services, plus $1,500 in legal fees. The lawsuit wasn't a laughing matter in itself, but the list of services the limousine company provided for Aretha certainly were. According to the bill Franklin ran up, on June 15, 1998, she hired a limousine to take her to the local Jenny Craig weight-loss center at a cost of $69.00 for that ride. The following month she was dispatching the limousine driver to pick up a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken for her—at a cost of $126.50 for the car service alone. Apparently Aretha decided to skip out on Jenny Craig altogether, and turned her attention to some of Colonel Sanders' extra crispy drumsticks. Three days later she had the same limo service pick up one of her friends, and then swing by the drive-in window at Burger King!

According to the suit, which was before Bloomfield Hills district court judge Edward Avadenka, the bill which Aretha racked up included:

June 15, 1998, drive Aretha to Jenny Craig Weight Loss Center ($69.00)

July 11, 1998, pick up Aretha, take her to dinner, and to a Janet Jackson concert ($569.25)

July 20, 1998, send the driver to Kentucky Fried Chicken ($126.50)

July 20, 1998, pick up Aretha and take her to lunch, the dry cleaners, and the grocery store ($126.50)

July 23, 1998, pick up one of Aretha's friends, take them to Burger King ($126.50)

July 30, 1998, pick up Aretha from her home, take her to Columbus, Ohio ($475.00)

The list went on from there, eighteen trips in all during the months of June and July. All-Star cited some of Franklin's favorite destinations as Cobo Cleaners, a Coney Island hot dog restaurant, and Kroger's supermarket. The limousine service was also used to pick up newspapers for Aretha, and provide various other services. According to All-Star's lawyer, Scott Yaldo of Birmingham, all of the invoices were sent to Ms. Franklin very respectfully addressed to “Dear Aretha.” Said Yaldo of his clients, “They don't want to be the bad guys, but they're a small company that relies on people paying their accounts.”
(34)
When
The Star
tabloid newspaper got hold of the story, they had a field day with it, publishing it with the headline, “When Queen Of Soul Wants Take-Out, She Pays Big Time.”
(35)
Divas do need their limousines, it goes with the territory!

This echoes the same problem that Sak's Fifth Avenue had with Aretha, when they filed a similar suit against her in 1995, also for the non-payment of her bills, suing for the clothing and accessory bill that she amassed at Sak's totaling $262,851.15. By 1998 the department store had dismissed the charges, and had written off the loss. The Internal Revenue Service was not so forgiving when they issued liens against her for declining to pay $500,000 in owed taxes.

In 1998, according to ABC News, Aretha's estimated worth was in the vicinity of $20 million. While Aretha is without peer in the singing department, apparently she is not so good with arithmetic or business sense when it comes time to pay her bills.

While being “dissed” publicly for her sloppy business practices, Aretha still had one more triumph to add to her list of 1998 accomplishments before the year was up. Aretha was booked at the Detroit Orchestra Hall to play a date with the highly revered Detroit Symphony Orchestra, on November 28, 1998. She had performed in the past with the Boston Symphony, and the Philadelphia Orchestra. However she had never performed with an orchestra in her own hometown. She explained at the time, “So I figured, ‘Since I'm going to sing with the symphony anyway, why not do a few more of the arias?'”
(24)

Could her die-hard fans handle the Queen of Soul going classical? “Absolutely!” she exclaimed, days before the concert took place, “Many times over. There are different kinds of soul. This is symphonic soul … I have very sophisticated fans, They like good music, just like I do.”
(24)

While the rest of the world was astonished at Aretha's seemingly sudden interest in classical music, she was quick to point out that her sister Erma had studied classical piano as a child. Recalls Aretha, “She used to play ‘Flight of the Bumblebee' just fabulously. I moved into classical music naturally. The appearance at the Grammys kind of piqued it. But I had been aware of the music long before that.”
(24)

According to her, ‘I've always heard it—never performed it, but I've always heard it. It's always been somewhere right there in the background. It's certainly a stretch from ‘Dr. Feelgood' to ‘Nessun Dorma,' but I love it, anyway, from one end of the spectrum to another.”
(36)

It was a classy and celebrity filled audience who came to witness the diva's Detroit operatic debut. Motown diva Martha Reeves was there, as well as Detroit Mayor Dennis Archer, and State of Michigan Representative John Conyers. Tickets for the event went for up to $150.00 each.

The show was divided into two distinctive halves. First the Detroit Symphony Orchestra played a program of instrumental classics, and then Aretha joined the ensemble. The orchestra's classical pieces included: Leonard Bernstein's “Candide” overture, William Grant Still's “African-American Symphony Scherzo,” Duke Ellington's “Solitude” and “Giggling Rapids” from
The River
, Dizzy Gillespie's “Manteca,” and Ralph Hermann's “Ellington Fantasy.”

Franklin's half of the show found her being preceded on-stage by an overture of classical pieces that were meant to bridge the classical into the pop realm. It included “Also Sprach Zarathustra (Theme from
2001
),” and the themes from
Jesus Christ Superstar
and
Chariots of Fire
.

Aretha's repertoire included a slow version of “Angel” with an on-stage ballet being performed while she sang. Other performed songs included “Freeway of Love,” “Why Do Fools Fall In Love?,” “Think,” and “It Hurts Like Hell.” However, the most anticipated performance of the evening was Aretha's singing “Vissi d'arte” from Puccini's
Tosca
.

Brian McCollum of
The Detroit Free Press
found her “sparkling in a brown, beaded silk gown—it was about immersing in the sort of glamorous and high art that has long magnetized her. The result was a frisky blend of sass and class, as when she paused—for just for a second— to subtly shake her rear while exiting the stage, just minutes before belting out an aria from Puccini's
Tosca
.”
(37)

Even
The Wall Street Journal
devoted a quarter page to Aretha. Writer Greg Sandow had both critical things to say, and glowing praises. “So, we'd better just ignore her overture,” he said in his review, “and also look away from the corps de ballet she brought on-stage while she sang ‘Angel,' one of her older hits, even though the choreography looked like it came from the really bad junior high school Christmas play. What matters is that she really is the Queen of Soul. Look at her, and you see a large woman with a disarmingly shy and eager baby face.”
(38)

Pointing out her phenomenal voice, Sandow claimed, “That's why she triumphs even with Puccini. She sang ‘Nussen Dorma,' from
Turnadot
, at this year's Grammy Awards; in Detroit she sang ‘Vissi d'arte,' from
Tosca
. You could say, with perfect truth, that her Italian could hardly sound more naïvely American, and that her style is heartily classical. But she makes the music go, like an innocent who finds wonders that scholars overlook, and her high note at the end could have brought the dead to life.” He also said that he wished there had been more jazz tunes in Aretha's repertoire. However he was quick to admit, “It's pointless to complain. She does what she does.”
(38)
That's Aretha!

Is singing an operatic aria any more difficult than singing any other kind of song? “I don't think so, no,” says Aretha. “You just have to be conscientious about certain things. But you have to do that with anything.”
(36)