"In the pews were hundreds of mourners, among them Jessye Norman, Leontyne Price, Dionne Warwick, Lauren Bacall, Chita Rivera, Cicely Tyson, Vanessa Williams and Gov. David A. Paterson. Leslie Uggams said that Ms. Horne had been someone to look up to. “When my father reluctantly figured out that I was going to go in show business,” Ms. Uggams recalled outside the church, he said, “I want you to be like Lena.”The service began with a cello piece by Bach. Later, Audra McDonald performed an arrangement of “This Little Light of Mine” and “Amazing Grace,” and one of four speakers, Representative John Lewis of Georgia, said Ms. Horne had been “a light, and she did shine."
I never had much of an opinion about Lena Horne--a passable supper-club singer, a civil wright stalwart, a beautiful woman, an MGM star that could never really became a star--until I learned, in Billy Strayhorn's biography Lush Life, she was very close to Ellington's legendary collaborator, and I purchased a record of her standards called, unsurprisingly, Stormy Weather--both her signature song and film role. Both gave me a better appreciation for her gifts and her personality.
Stormy Weather was a great film, and she was a giant.
The list of mourners is fantastic--Leontyne Price and Jessye Norman the ones I was most pleased to see.
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