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Lillie Fort Formerly of Raelets & Sisters Love R.I.P.
Attachment 18440
Remembering Former Ray Charles Raelets Singer LILLIE FORT [[78)
If, by chance, you hear the soft, sure soprano voice of a Soul Angel offering a haunting refrain like Ellington’s “Creole Love Call” - by way of Memphis - one starry autumn-into-winter’s night, that’s just Lillie, warming up her chops on her way to Heaven…
Most renown for providing the female counter-voice to Brother Ray Charles on his hit recording “Crying Time” during her 1964-1967 tenure as one of The Genius of Soul’s “Raelets,” Lillie Fort was the very definition of a Songbird with a soprano voice that was as lovely as it could be powerful.
Post-Raelets, Lillie was a member of the super-talented yet ill-fated vocal quartet Sisters Love, initially a vehicle for Merry Clayton that also included Gwendolyn Berry, Odia Coates, Jeanie Long and later, Vermettya Royster. Though the group’s late `60s to late `70s history went from indie labels to 8 singles on A&M Records [[personally signed by Herb Alpert as the label’s very first R&B act) to being sat down on the sidelines at Motown for YEARS, only squeezing a handful of singles out, no album - Sisters Love were seasoned soul mamas that could take it to the stage and burn the mother DOWN.
Sisters Love was the inaugural group to perform at comedian Redd Foxx’s nightclub on La Cienega. They opened for Isaac Hayes at the Los Angeles Sports Arena just after his pioneering emergence with the Hot Buttered Soul LP. They opened for The Jackson 5 on their first European tour. Were regulars at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. Performed their percussive rendition of Curtis Mayfield’s “Give Me Your Love” on Don Cornelius “Soul Train.” Sisters Love also appeared in the colorful, fashion-draped and notorious nightclub scene at The Player’s Ball in the 70s Black action screen gem “The Mack,” shot at Sportsman’s Lounge in Oakland where the Sisters serendipitously happened to be performing during the week of filming and were invited to get their 15 minutes of Black celluloid fame. But by decades end, after moonlighting as The Chocolate Kisses, the group quietly disbanded, remaining sisters personally.
In 2010, I was honored to be asked by producers Paul Williams and Rudy Calvo to write a detailed liner note essay for a 15-song project titled With Love [[Reel Music Records) that finally brought the release of just SOME of their shelved Motown music to market and to tell The Sisters Love story. Though Gwen and Odia had already passed away, it was my pleasure to interview surviving members Merry, Vermettya, Jeanie and Miss Lillie…my favorite. We hit it off for a number of reasons, one being that she lived in Rialto where I spent 4 precious years of my childhood. I just adored all that Memphis up in her and how she always kept me laughing. In the liner notes, I made sure to set her up sweet for her big showcase song. Reprinting that paragraph and one other below – which I RARELY do, y’all – just to show you the true SPARKLE of her personality. The attached video is the song she sings:
The finest of the group’s Hal Davis productions was a very special feature for Lillie Fort; a cover of a song from the Gold-selling, Grammy-earning pen of the great Jimmy Webb entitled “Do What You Gotta Do.” It was Motown A&R executive Suzanne dePasse who recognized this one as a potential gem from Sisters Love’s stage show. “When we performed that song at our press party,” Lillie shares, “Suzanne flipped. That was my song! I had been singing it since the Redd Foxx days. I remember we played at a lil’ steak house up in Santa Maria once. Usually when you play places like that, folks are eating all through your show. When we hit that stage, folks put their forks down! On ‘Do What You Gotta Do,” a man stood up on a table with tears flowing down his cheeks waving his hands like he was attending a church service! But I really honed that number during an engagement at Caesar’s Palace. I came up with that spoken intro as a way to catch my breath from whatever we had been singing before so I could really pour my heart out once we got into the song. Suzanne dePasse heard it and immediately asked me if I had a copy. I just happened to have a rehearsal cassette. She had Hal Davis personally drive down in his Rolls Royce to my house – IN THE GHETTO – and pick it up. Inside of 10 days, he came up with the track you hear now. That was one case where I saw that when Motown really wanted to, they could get behind something they truly believed in. But, again, it never saw the light of day.” This was truly a tragedy as the 5-minute mini-epic was a showstopper thanks to Lillie’s heartfelt lead as well as the outstanding background vocal arrangement with which her sisters backed her. Vermettya says, “Ms. Lillie is from Memphis, Tennessee…and she sounds like it! She reaches the hearts of men when she sings because she knows just the way to put `em in a melancholy way.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqkFbqHsYAw
Lillie recounts the subtle inside competition and jockeying for said respect. “As far as I was concerned, everybody already knew I was a singer with Sisters Love. If someone else felt the need to quantify their stage introduction with ‘I am the lead singer of,’ that was on them. But when you get out on that stage and do whatever you do – baby, you better do your best. Cuz the three of us are back here and are gonna do our best to rock this building! And when ‘the man’ comes with the money, I don’t have no problem with all you’ve been doin’ ‘up front.’ But if he gives you two cents more than he gives me…it’s on!”
Lillie Fort was a Sawyer Business School graduate who finished out her working days for the State of California. She enjoyed cooking in her retirement and the fact that her family was never far away right over in Riverside.
Personally, there will always be a space in my heart for Lillie. We sent each other loving, encouraging messages here on Facebook. She praised my work on the “Millie Jackson Unsung,” purchased, used and dug my mother’s seasoning blends. She was so one-of-a-kind...I wish we had more time...
Lillie, you are now free to rejoin your friends up yonder, roll around Heaven all day and share the best of your big loving heart with angels that will love and appreciate you for you...forever.
A. Scott Galloway
December 7, 2020 - 10:42pm
