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Melanie, the husky-voiced singer and songwriter who was one of many shock stars of the Woodstock music pageant in 1969 and two years later had a No. 1 single with the disarmingly childlike “Model New Key,” died on Tuesday. She was 76.
Her demise was introduced on social media by her youngsters, Leilah, Jeordie and Beau Jarred. Neither the trigger nor the situation have been cited.
Melanie, born Melanie Safka in 1947, was solely 22 however already a presence on the New York folks scene when she appeared at Woodstock. She was one in every of solely three girls who carried out unaccompanied on the pageant — and, as she later recalled, she was petrified on the considered performing in entrance of a crowd vastly larger than the coffeehouse audiences she was used to.
It began to rain earlier than she took the stage, and she or he would later say that the sight of individuals within the crowd lighting candles impressed her to jot down “Lay Down (Candles within the Rain),” which she recorded with gospel-style backing from the Edwin Hawkins Singers. Launched in 1970, it grew to become her first hit, reaching No. 6 on the Billboard Scorching 100.
Her largest hit, “Model New Key,” charmed listeners with its simplicity however generated controversy — and was stated to have been banned by some radio stations — as a result of some individuals heard sexual innuendo in lyrics like “I’ve acquired a brand-new pair of curler skates/You’ve acquired a brand-new key.” She acknowledged that the phrases may very well be interpreted that method, however insisted that this was not her intention.
“‘Model New Key’ I wrote in about quarter-hour one evening,” she advised one interviewer. “I believed it was cute; a type of previous ’30s tune.
“I assume a key and a lock have at all times been Freudian symbols,” she continued, “and fairly apparent ones at that. There was no deep severe expression behind the music, however individuals learn issues into it.”
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