And there you are in heaven, Etta James

The amazing Etta James died yesterday after battling leukemia and dementia. She would have turned 74 next Wednesday.

Everyone thinks of “At Last” whenever she’s mentioned but my favorite Etta song is her heartfelt, tear-inducing rendition of “I’d Rather Go Blind.” I’ve heard it hundreds of times and I still cry every time.

Although “At Last” became her signature tune (and was covered by Stevie Wonder, Nat King Cole, Ella Fitzgerald, B.B. King and Diane Schuur, among others), there are many other Etta James songs that you should immediately – as in right this minute – check out on YouTube, Spotify, iTunes or whatever, including “Trust in Me,” “Tell Mama,” “Baby, What You Want Me to Do,” “Piece of My Heart,” “Something’s Got a Hold on Me,” “Stop the Wedding” and “I Just Want to Make Love to You.”

I also recommend “A Sunday Kind of Love,” “Don’t Cry Baby,” “If I Can’t Have You,” “The Fool That I Am,” “Only Women Bleed,” “Dance With Me, Henry” and “It’s a Man’s, Man’s, Man’s World.”

Simply put, I think Etta James was one of the greatest female blues/jazz/R&B/doo-wop/pop singers not just of the 1950s and 1960s but ever. She didn’t just read lyrics into a microphone. She felt what she was singing, the hurt, anger, regret, melancholy, love, lust, happiness and despair, and I could feel the emotions she was feeling too, from the first note to the last.

There’s no shortage of gifted, powerful, impressive vocalists – Beyoncé, Christina Aguilera and Mariah Carey come to mind – who can really belt out the notes and make you want to get up and shake your moneymaker, but they don’t make me smile or reduce me to tears after six words like Etta James could with her sultry, often lugubrious contralto. It seemed like she infused the lyrics – each word, each syllable – with some kind of emotion, with pain or fatigue or resolve or hopefulness or strength or fragility or vulnerability or joy.

Etta James didn’t just entertain. She moved me. She altered me. She made me change my mind and gave me hope and forced me to smile and told me that I’m not alone, that others have been where I am and lived to see another day and I can too. She made me realize that some singers have layers, dimensions, scars and wounds, and that an almost-otherworldly singer like her is worth at least three or four of the photogenic, ass-shaking, tummy-flashing warblers on X Factor and American Idol.

I’m glad she received recognition for her gift while she was still able to enjoy it. (She was ranked #22 on Rolling Stone’s list of the “100 Greatest Singers of All Time,” received the NAACP Image Award, a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and six Grammys – including a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2003 – and was inducted into both the Blues and Rock and Roll Halls of Fame.) But I’m not glad that she had such a hard life. She was abused as a girl, wasn’t close to her mother, didn’t know her father – interestingly, she thought he might be pool player “Minnesota Fats” and met him in 1987 but paternity was never determined – and struggled with drugs, rehab and legal problems throughout her life. I’ll never understand why some seem to have it so easy while others need Herculean strength and good fortune just to make it through the day.

I also wonder why artists in pain – people like Etta James, Kurt Cobain, Sylvia Plath, Ernest Hemingway, Billie Holiday, Amy Winehouse, Vincent van Gogh and Janis Joplin – always leave the biggest marks. What is it about hardship, loss, sorrow and demons that make a good singer, writer or painter great, that lead to cult followings and stand-out performances and creations that are revered for decades?

It’s no wonder Ms. James has been cited as a major influence by countless notable talents, including Diana Ross, Beyoncé, Janis Joplin, Rod Stewart, Bonnie Raitt, Ms. Winehouse, Joss Stone and Adele. She was a true groundbreaker, a raw and uniquely talented woman who could permanently affect the lives of strangers just by singing a song.

Thanks to Spotify and my CD collection, she hasn’t really left.

Photographed at New York's B.B. King Blues Club on May 12, 2009.

Courtesy Jamie-James Medina.

Sources: New York Daily News, Squidoo.com