Late Cissy Houston hailed for ‘unparalleled’ impact on music, culture

LOS ANGELES (AP):

The family of Cissy Houston, the two-time Grammy-winning soul and gospel artiste who sang with Aretha Franklin, Elvis Presley and other stars and knew triumph and heartbreak as the mother of Whitney Houston, has paid tribute to the late star.

Cissy Houston died Monday morning in her New Jersey home while under hospice care for Alzheimer’s disease, her daughter-in-law Pat Houston told AP. She was 91. The acclaimed gospel singer was surrounded by her family.

“Our hearts are filled with pain and sadness. We lost the matriarch of our family,” Pat Houston said in a statement. She said her mother-in-law’s contributions to popular music and culture are “unparalleled”.

“Mother Cissy has been a strong and towering figure in our lives. A woman of deep faith and conviction, who cared greatly about family, ministry, and community. Her more than seven-decade career in music and entertainment will remain at the forefront of our hearts.”

Pat Houston said she is thankful for the many valuable lessons learnt from her mother-in-law. She said the family feels “blessed and grateful” that God allowed Cissy to spend so many years.

“We are touched by your generous support, and your outpouring of love during our profound time of grief,” Houston said on behalf of the family. “We respectfully request our privacy during this difficult time.”

A church performer from an early age, Houston was part of a family gospel act before breaking through in popular music in the 1960s as a member of the prominent backing group The Sweet Inspirations with Doris Troy and her niece Dee Dee Warwick. The group sang backup for a variety of soul singers including Otis Redding, Lou Rawls and The Drifters. They also sang backup for Dionne Warwick.

Houston’s many credits included Franklin’s Think and (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman, Van Morrison’s Brown Eyed Girl and Dusty Springfield’s Son of a Preacher Man. The Sweet Inspirations also sang on stage with Presley.

Her last performance with The Sweet Inspirations came after the group hit the stage with Presley in a Las Vegas show in 1969. Her final recording session with the group turned into their biggest R&B hit (Gotta Find) A Brand New Lover, a composition by the production team of Gamble & Huff, who appeared on the group’s fifth album, Sweet Sweet Soul.

After the group’s success and four albums together, Houston left The Sweet Inspirations to pursue a solo career where she flourished. She became an in-demand session singer and recorded more than 600 songs in multiple genres throughout her career. Her vocals can be heard on tracks alongside a wide range of artistes including Chaka Khan, Donny Hathaway, Jimi Hendrix, Luther Vandross, Beyoncé, Paul Simon, Roberta Flack and Whitney Houston.

Never far from her native New Jersey or musical origins, Houston presided for decades over the 200-member Youth Inspirational Choir at Newark’s New Hope Baptist Church, where Whitney Houston sang as a child.

Cissy Houston would say that she had discouraged her daughter from show business, but they were joined in music for much of Whitney’s life, from church to stage performances to television and film and the recording studio.

Whitney Houston made her debut on national television when she and Cissy Houston sang a medley of Franklin hits on The Merv Griffin Show. Cissy Houston sang backup on Whitney’s eponymous, multi-platinum first album, and the two shared the lead on I Know Him So Well, from the 1987 mega-seller Whitney. They would sing together often in concert and appeared in the 1996 film The Preacher’s Wife. But drug problems damaged Whitney’s voice and reputation and eventually ended her life: she was found dead in a Beverly Hills bathtub on February 11, 2012.

Cissy Houston was briefly married to Freddie Garland in the 1950s; their son, Gary Garland, was a guard for the Denver Nuggets and later sang on many of Whitney Houston’s tours. Cissy Houston was married to Whitney’s father, entertainment executive John Russell Houston, from 1959 to 1990. In addition to Whitney, the Houstons also had a son, Michael.