Roberta Flack Information Continued
Roberta Flack was raised in Arlington, Virginia. She first discovered the
work of African American musical artists when she heard Mahalia Jackson and Sam
Cooke sing in a predominantly black Baptist church to which her family did not
belong. In her early teens, she so excelled at classical piano that Howard University
awarded her a full music scholarship. She matriculated at Howard at the age of 15,
making her one of the youngest students ever to enroll there. She eventually
changed her major from piano to voice, and became an assistant conductor of the
university choir. Her direction of a production of Aida received a
standing ovation from the Howard faculty.
Roberta Flack then taught school for some years in Montgomery
County, Maryland. During this period, her music career began to take shape on
evenings and weekends in Washington area night spots. Roberta Flack's
Atlantic recordings did not sell particularly well until Clint Eastwood chose a song
from her debut album First Take, "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face", for
the sound track of his directorial debut Play Misty for Me; it became a #1 hit in 1972.
Eastwood has remained an admirer and friend of Roberta Flack ever since.
In 1983, she recorded the end music to the Dirty Harry film Sudden Impact.
