Lori Lieberman

Lori Lieberman earned recognition for her warm vocal delivery, incisive songwriting, and folk-tinged approach by originating the composition and initial recording of “Killing Me Softly with His Song,” a track that reached the summit of the charts for Roberta Flack in 1973 and for Fugees in 1996. Drawn from a poem she wrote after witnessing Don McLean at the Troubadour in Los Angeles, the song surfaced on her self-titled debut album, released by Capitol Records in 1972. The follow-up, Becoming, placed her on the Billboard 200 for the first time in 1973. Following the arrival of her fifth studio effort, Letting Go, in 1978, she stepped away from new album releases for an extended interval. Her return came with A Thousand Dreams in 1995, inaugurating a series of periodic recordings that encompassed the politically charged Bricks Against the Glass in 2013 and Truly in 2022, the latter revisiting “Killing Me Softly with His Song” while interpreting selections from the American Songbook with a jazz quartet.

Her early years alternated between California and Switzerland, where she completed her studies at the International School of Geneva in 1970. Already active as a singer and composer, she secured a publishing and recording agreement with Capitol Records and the songwriting team of Charles Fox and Norman Gimbel upon her return to the United States. Those two collaborators would later supply themes for films such as The Last American Hero and Foul Play as well as television series including The Paper Chase, Happy Days, and Laverne & Shirley. Lieberman, Fox, and Gimbel immediately began work on her 1972 Capitol debut, Lori Lieberman, which contained “Killing Me Softly with His Song,” a piece reflecting her reaction to Don McLean’s Troubadour performance; Fox supplied the music while Lieberman and Gimbel received credit for the words. Roberta Flack’s 1973 cover ascended to the top of the Hot 100, securing Grammys for Record of the Year and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.

Lieberman rejoined Fox and Gimbel in the studio for Becoming, which entered the Billboard 200 at number 192 in 1973. She completed two further Capitol projects, A Piece of Time in 1974 and Straw Colored Girl the following year, before severing ties with the label and her longtime collaborators. The compilation The Best of Lori Lieberman surfaced in Europe in 1976. In 1977 she contributed vocals to the Schoolhouse Rock segment “Great American Melting Pot.” She then recorded Letting Go with producer Paul Leka, known for his work with the Left Banke and Harry Chapin; issued by Millennium Records through Casablanca Records/RCA in 1978, the album featured the sardonic track “Jingle,” which reflected on her industry experiences. Apart from supplying material for the television series Fame in the mid-1980s, she withdrew from music.

Actor and eventual husband Joseph Cali encouraged her return, at which point she had three children and lingering reservations. She nevertheless wrote and recorded A Thousand Dreams for the independent Pope Music label in 1995. The same imprint followed with Home of Whispers in 1996, the year Lauryn Hill–led Fugees released their version of “Killing Me Softly with His Song,” which topped charts in at least twenty countries and earned a Grammy for Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal. Lieberman issued Gone Is the Girl in 1998, her last Pope Music release, before founding Drive On Records and self-releasing several albums, beginning with Monterey in 2003.

Entirely written and arranged by Lieberman, Gun Metal Sky appeared in 2009 and was issued the next year in Europe by V2 Records under the title Takes Courage. Bend Like Steel followed on Drive On/V2 in 2011 and included a cover of Simon & Garfunkel’s “Cecilia.” Co-produced by Lieberman and Cali, the protest-oriented Bricks Against the Glass arrived in 2013 and preceded a sold-out Carnegie Hall concert in November 2014. Butler Records released Ready for the Storm in 2015; the fifteen-track collection was mixed by Bob Clearmountain, whose credits include the Rolling Stones and Bruce Springsteen. Another Butler project, The Girl and The Cat, emerged in 2019 and featured the Dutch string ensemble Matangi Quartet, which also joined Lieberman for her second sold-out Carnegie Hall engagement. Her debut collection of covers, Truly, appeared on Drive On Records in 2022 and paid tribute to the Great American Songbook. Co-produced by Lieberman and Matt Rollings and engineered by Clearmountain, the album paired her with a jazz quartet and presented a revised rendition of “Killing Me Softly with His Song.”