Aretha Franklin announces album with covers of songs by other iconic women

Aretha Franklin is feeling better and ready to get back to work. The Queen of Soul said that she is planning on a new album and is ready to go back to the stage.

During an interview with Billboard Friday, Franklin said that she’s going to go back to her hometown of Detroit on Jan. 1 to record new vocals. Producers Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds and Don Was have already begun work on the instrumental tracks and Clive Davis is executive producing the project.

“It's a concept CD,” Franklin said, noting that she and Davis picked 10 songs to make an “ultimate list” of tracks by women who are as legendary as she is. Two of the songs will be Barbra Streisand’s “People” and Donna Summer's "Last Dance." She joked that she may even cover the Destiny’s Child song “Bootylicious.”

“It's just re-working some things that were very, very good and certainly chartworthy and sold a lot of records,” Franklin explained. RCA Records hopes to have the album out in the second quarter of 2014.

She also has complete faith in Was and Babyface to create some great tracks for her to lay her vocals on top of. She’s also excited to work with Was after hearing great things about him from her colleagues.

“Each person that I spoke with about him had nothing but good things to say about him and a lot of praise and admiration,” she told Billboard. “I know for certain Mr. Davis would not have asked him if he couldn't do the job.”

Back in July, FRanklin had to cancel several shows because of an undisclosed illness, but the AP confirms that she’ll be singing for an audience today the MotorCity Casino Hotel's Sound Board in Detroit. She’s also scheduled to perform at Radio City Music Hall in New York next month.

image: Wikimedia Commons

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