Even among superstars there’s a hierarchy of ‘great – greater – greatest’ … and Barbra Streisand is at the pinnacle of superstardom. She’s one of the few ‘EGOT’ winners of Emmy/Grammy/Oscar/Tony awards – actually she’s got several of them – along with shelves full of other awards and accolades. She’s also been a commercial mega-success, selling over 150 million records worldwide, and she’s the only recording artist to score a #1 album in each of six consecutive decades. Billboard ranked her the greatest female album artist.
Barbra is turning 80 on Sunday, and richly deserves a spotlight in which I’ll play eleven landmark songs – from the very first recording she made at age 13 (a song we’ve never featured before) through her chart-topping hits, to duets with Neil Diamond, Barry Gibb and Michael Buble, to conclude with a timely song from her most recent album.
I’ll also have a half-hour feature on 3 key albums Gordon Lightfoot released in April’s past. The first-hour feature: ‘This Week in Zoomer Music‘ remembers the Broadway debut of ‘America’s Tribal Love Rock Musical’ ‘Hair’ this week in 1968 and, a few years later, another New York icon – ‘Studio 54’, the world’s most famous discotheque – opened this week in 1977. You’ll want your disco-duds and dancing shoes to fully enjoy ‘The Story Behind the Song‘ ‘Le Freak’ – which relates very closely to Studio 54. Cheers.