When Aretha subbed for Pavarotti at the Grammys

Pavarotti was too ill to perform. The story goes that Ken Ehrlich, producer of the 1998 Grammys, approached Aretha in her dressing room with a cassette. In Ehrlich’s words: “When she heard it, she said, ‘Yeah, I can do this.'”

For one aria, the queen of soul became “royalty in the world of opera.”