One of the best things to happen to popular music in the 1970s were collaborations by two profoundly talented soul singers: Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway. They released two studio albums, the last of which, Roberta Flack Featuring Donny Hathaway, was not completed by Hathaway because he killed himself in 1979; and the first of which, Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway, was a huge hit and showed the world that sad songs did not have to sound sad. “Where Is The Love” is about a person falling love with someone who is already taken, and the broken heart that has to wait and wait and wait for the day (which may never come) when this special someone is free again and might return the love. This is all very sad, but the music and singing on the tune is lush, expressive, and soulfully sunny. But the album is not only about lovers on the rocks; it also has a political tune, “Be Real Black For Me,” and a tune that draws all of its power and majesty from the central institution of black America, the church: “Come Ye Disconsolate.”
Soliloquies of Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway is a show at the Royal Room organized by local singer Om Johari. (Om is a member of RE-IGNITION, a Bad Brains tribute band, and was a member of Hell’s Belles, an all-female AC/DC tribute band.) The show is, of course, devoted to Flack’s and Hathaway’s musical collaborations, and features a number of local singers (Caine Coldnote, Lisa Mansfield, Riz Rollins—to name a few) supported by excellent local musicians (D’Vonne Lewis, Skerik and Ahamefule J. Oluo among them). This will be the place to be on Friday night. And not just because of the music, but also due to the venue’s location: Columbia City.
Johari explained to me recently that she wants more black shows in this part of town because black Americans now mostly live South Seattle, Renton, and other parts of South King County. Venues in Ballard and Fremont, in her opinion—which I think is correct—are just too far away from these communities. Also, because the city’s population is exploding, the roads to Ballard and Fremont are often clogged with traffic. All this makes it hard for blacks to see black acts at this or that North Seattle place. Johari wants Columbia City to become the downtown for black arts and events, and her show, Soliloquies of Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway, is a part of this vision.
