Howard University Community Mourns Loss of Roberta Flack

(Roberta Flack/AP News)

On Feb. 24, four-time Grammy winner and Howard University alumna Roberta Flack passed away. 

Flack attended Howard University at 15 on a music scholarship and received her Bachelor’s degree in Music in 1958.

After graduating from Howard University, Flack served as a school teacher in the D.C. area for 10 years and sang at jazz clubs—including Mr.Henry’s on Pennsylvania Ave. 

There she was discovered by jazz pianist Les McCann in 1968 and signed to Atlantic Records a year later. 

Flack is responsible for many hit records including “The Closer I Get To You,” with former Howard classmate singer Donny Hathaway. She won a Grammy with Hathaway in 1973 for Best Pop Duo for the song “Where is the Love.” 

“Killing Me Softly With His Song,” another popular song of Flack’s, won a Grammy in 1974 and was later covered by Lauryn Hill of the rap group, The Fugees. Flack earned a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame in 1999.

In her later years, Flack pursued music and love in all shapes and forms. She founded The Roberta Flack Foundation which provided grants to programs like SheLectricity, a program that promotes STEAM for creative outlets like music to young women of color in the Memphis area. Within the foundation, she founded the Roberta Flack School of Music located at Hyde Leadership Charter School in the Bronx, New York. This program provides free musical education to students.

With a successful career,  Flack’s passing is a loss to the Howard community. 

Valerie ‘Kehembe’ Eichelberger is an associate professor for classical and jazz voice in the College of Fine Arts who attended voice lessons with the same private instructor as Flack. 

Eichelberger reflected on her relationship with Flack and the work she did at the Kennedy Center with students at Howard University. Flack composed a concert for Paul Johnson, a famous arranger and brought students from the choir to perform.

“She brought things not only just musically, but ideas and the reason why we’re doing a thing, she would make that very clear that we’re not performing just for the sake of performance. But we perform because we have a purpose,” said Eichelberger.