(Credits: Raph Pour-Hashemi)
Sun 21 December 2025 12:30, UK
In a perfect world, Elton John probably would have never been allowed to get behind the microphone when he first began.
He didn’t see himself as a showstopping singer when he began writing his tunes, but when no one else was interested in singing them, it was up to him to either sing the whole thing himself or go back to being a backup keyboardist for other bands. And since he had a certain magic with Bernie Taupin, he was going to do everything within his power to make sure that he studied the best singers that he could to do his songs justice.
It’s not like John’s songs are exactly the easiest things to sing, either. There are plenty of tunes in his arsenal that feel like the simplest melodies in the world, but given how high his voice could go in a song like ‘Goodbye Yellow Brick Road’, most aspiring singers would have to put their falsetto through its paces before they are ready to do that song justice. But that came from listening to the best singers that the pop world had ever produced.
John was openly in awe of people like Stevie Wonder, and when listening to the way that the Motown legend devoured nearly every single tune that he played, it’s hard to imagine anyone getting anywhere close to that. There was a lot of craft that went into every one of those tunes, but John also kept his eye out for artists that could interpret songs in a way that no one else could possibly imagine.
If you think about it, some of the best singers in the world are the ones that don’t necessarily need to write their own songs. It’s great when they do, but if you look at everyone from Elvis Presley to Johnny Cash, neither of them were known for being completely original every single time they walked into the studio. They had their moments, but sometimes they needed the right songwriter to step up so they could knock it out of the park.
Being a great rock or country singer was one thing, but soul music was a much different story. Everyone from Motown or Stax Records in Memphis had brilliant voices that hardly anyone could have imagined, but while John had a healthy respect for everyone from Aretha Franklin to Marvin Gaye, there was something that stopped him in his tracks the minute that he heard Dusty Springfield sing.
She might not have been born and bred in the same towns that birthed her fellow music legends but John felt no one could transform a song like she could, saying, “She blossomed. She was a perfectionist. She had an incredible vocal technique. Her interpretations of songs by Bacharach, David, and Goffin/King was some of the best there ever had been. She was a songwriter’s singer. More than anything, she was vulnerable. So powerful, yet there’s something so melodic about it that moves me to this day.”
While a lot of her best moments on record tend to do more with her singles, Dusty in Memphis is still one of the finest soul albums that didn’t come out of the US. Her pilgrimage to the place where all the greatest soul music was birthed was absolutely magical on record, and when you listen to her renditions of tunes like ‘Son of a Preacher Man’, you would have sworn that she had lived every single second of life that people like Al Green had in their prime.
That voice might not have been suited to John whenever he tried making pop tunes or the occasional country ballad, but Springfield’s voice wasn’t about trying to be a showstopper every time she sang. There’s a lot of strength to her voice, but the subtlety behind her ballads is what kept people coming back to see the vulnerable person underneath all of those classic hits.
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