Ken Tucker
speaker
453 appearances
27 recordings
1 series
first heard Nov 2024
last heard 17 Sep
Ken Tucker’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 15 in all, peaking in Aug 2026 with 3.
Appearances
This is what I mean about Sparkle being such an underrated achievement for both Franklin and Mayfield.
As I said earlier, Sparkle wasn't a smash in 1976, but it developed an intense cult following that has reverberations.
I don't think it's a coincidence, for instance, that Dream Girls, a far bigger success in nineteen eighty one, bears a striking resemblance to Sparkle.
Sparkle was remade in twenty twelve starring Jordan Sparks and Whitney Houston, and was a modest hit.
But the collaboration between Aretha Franklin and Curtis Mayfield transcends the movie.
It stands on its own as a rich, risk taking collection that deserves a reevaluation in twentieth century pop music history.
freedom to speak out.
Our weekly series, If you can keep it, tackles the big political stories of the day.
And why they matter
What is it that you can do to potentially quote unquote scare the American people?
Water is one of those things that's a necessity of light.
Did police ever call you?
Not once.
The movie Sparkle follows the troubles and triumphs of a trio of singers trying to make it in the soul music world of the 1960s.
Released in nineteen seventy six, Sparkle was the film debut of Irene Cara, who'd become a big star four years later in the movie Fame.
The movie was only a modest success, and what now seems most impressive about Sparkle are Curtis Mayfield's songs as sung by Aretha Franklin.
That's Look Into Your Heart, a dreamy ballad powered by Aretha's passionate singing.
As is true of every song here, Franklin is holding nothing back.
She's pouring as much of herself into these Curtis Mayfield compositions as she did in the staggeringly great series of hit singles she made for Atlantic Records in the late 60s.
Mayfield was of course familiar with the ways of Hollywood movie music as the man who gave us the theme from the black exploitation film classic Shaft in nineteen seventy two.
Showing 101–120 of 453 · page 6 of 23
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