Monday, December 24, 2012

RIP Marva Whitney



"Marva Whitney, one of the greats of funk and soul and the woman whom James Brown called “Soul Sister #1″, passed away last night (December 23, 2012). She was 68....

...In 1969, Whitney made her first solo recordings for King, Brown’s label at the time. She scored a Top 20 hit on the R&B charts with ‘It’s My Thing (You Can’t Tell Me Who to Sock It To)’, which was a rewrite of the Isley Brothers hit, and the follow-up, ‘Things Got to Get Better (Get Together)’ just missed the R&B Top 20. Much of Whitney’s work has been sampled in hip hop tracks, most notably ‘Unwind Yourself’.

In December 2009, Marva collapsed on stage in front of thousands of fans at the Falls Festival in Lorne, Australia, while performing with The Transatlantics. Taken to Geelong Hospital and diagnosed with a stroke, she made a recovery and was performing again in 2010..." Source: Noise11.

Whitney's most recent recordings were an outstanding album with Japanese funk outfit Osaka Monaurail released in 2006, called I Am What I Am. There are some live clips of them playing together in London in 2009.

No comments: