Phil Flowers

Washington-area singer and songwriter Phil Flowers Sr. composed several hundred songs across rock, blues, gospel, and ballad styles over the course of his professional life. Breakthrough success arrived after “Cry on My Shoulder” achieved strong regional sales along the East Coast, which in turn secured a national television slot on the Dick Clark Show and an invitation to perform at the White House in 1968 under the Johnson administration. In the wake of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination that same year, Flowers and his ensemble were sent into neighborhoods affected by unrest to perform and help calm tensions. He later shared a bill with Martha & the Vandellas and frequently toured alongside his children and siblings, who provided backing vocals. In his final years Flowers appeared primarily aboard cruise ships and also played engagements in Bermuda, Saudi Arabia, Puerto Rico, and Europe. Other artists recorded his material, among them Glen Campbell, who released a version of “I May Never Pass This Way Again,” and the British band the Chartbusters, who cut “Slippin’ Through Your Fingers.” Flowers died of cancer on January 22, 2001, at the age of 66.