Anita Baker: Sweet love, enduring
The farewell tour for singer Anita Baker is a chance to pause and reflect on how sweet it is and always has been.
One of the greatest voices in popular music, Baker defies categorization. She may have won Grammys in R&B and gospel categories, but she has collected a worldwide following among pop and jazz fans for the sheer beauty of her sound and the mesmerizing feeling she brings to love songs.
Her tour, which stops Friday for a sold-out show at Bob Carr Theater in downtown Orlando, is a chance to hear the 60-year-old songstress deliver “Sweet Love,” “Giving You the Best That I Got,” “Same Ole Love,” “I Apologize,” “Been So Long” and “No One in the World.”
Her hits from the 1980s and ’90s are timeless because of her artistry. Beyoncé and Kendrick Lamar have cited her influence when they were growing up, and Lamar praised Baker’s ability to “just touch the soul.” YouTube and Spotify introduce her sound and videos to younger listeners. She connects with fans via Twitter.
Baker has the voice of a diva, but she doesn’t have the manner of a diva. She’s like a neighbor or a friend, a grounded figure whose warmth comes through in her performances.
That’s clear from the shaky video of a 2012 concert at Radio City Music Hall in New York. Baker tells of her gratitude “that I got to hold this microphone for 25 years of transitions.”
“It’s a blessing,” she added. “Thanks for sharing it with me.”
Then going into “No One in the World,” she stood back and let the audience sing.
Baker may never have achieved the megastardom of Whitney Houston or Mariah Carey. They kept putting up No. 1 hits, they appeared in reality shows, and their personal lives generated long-running dramas in the press.
Baker was born in Toledo, Ohio, grew up in Detroit and resides in Grosse Pointe, Mich. She has lived quietly for the most part, putting her career on hold for family, bringing up two sons and caring for ill relatives. Her divorce and legal battles made headlines, then she and her fans
moved on.
Her faith has given her perspective. On her Twitter page, she writes: “Our Father is my Sanctuary. Every New Morning is offered up to HIS glory. In GRATITUDE for the gift of LIFE & Retirement.”
Some contemporaries have brought more theatricality to their singing. Whitney could shake your house’s foundation, and Mariah can still deliver vocal acrobatics along with making you worry how she’ll fare on New Year’s Eve.
Anita can soar, too — just listen to “Sweet Love,” her 1986 breakthrough.
Yet she is always serving the song, not showing off. That authenticity enriches her work; that restraint pays dividends in an over-the-top world.
She has won eight Grammys, but that’s a wobbly barometer of lasting success. Award stats become the stuff of trivia contests while great recordings last, a legacy that can be returned to over and over. “Sweet Love” never goes out of style.
Baker stands in the tradition of the finest singers. She can perform with the exhilarating ease of Ella Fitzgerald, the crystal-clear beauty of Barbra Streisand, the jazzy bravura of Sarah Vaughan. Baker even joined Frank Sinatra for “Witchcraft” on his 1993 “Duets” album.
Although fans may wish that she had recorded more, she did things her way, and the results were choice.
The song title “You Bring Me Joy” sums up the way fans feel about her. We know she has given us the best that she’s got.