RIP: Joe Cocker

[porkchops]

It's high time I went ....... and listened to some Joe Cocker.
R.I.P. Joe

[clydepepper]

When I was teenager there were three large posters of famous people on my bedroom wall -- Bob Dylan, D.H. Lawrence and Joe Cocker in the middle of a scream in concert at Woodstock. The picture of Joe frightened my mother, but I reassured her. "No mom, he's an emotional visionary."

I didn’t know then, but I know now, that if you wish for something with your whole heart, it has a pretty good chance of coming true.

In the early '80s, other than a few great pairs such as Ella and Louis, Loretta and Conway, duets were not common on the charts. Music that year was weighted down with synthesizers and rhinestone jumpsuits. I was home watching one of those less than wonderful Grammy telecasts when Joe appeared singing "I'm So Glad I’m Standing Here Today" with the Crusaders. His voice was like a knife cutting through me. He laid his heart right on the table. I also knew right then that we would sing together.

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Then that beautiful song by Will Jennings, Buffy Sainte-Marie and Jack Nitzsche fell into our hands. The movie wanted us. Things just fell together. I agree that the pairing of a rough Sheffield blues guy with a folkie-pop girl seemed odd. To make it worse they dressed me in taffeta, Joe in a suit, it was crazy. We looked like two prom kids, not like Ella and Louis. But in 1983 we toured the big wide world and never lip-synced once. That was our rule, no lip syncing. Every performance was the real deal, a free falling skydive. Geronimo! Joe took his liberties with the song and I chased after. Singing with Joe was often risky and always thrilling. Those are great memories that I will keep in my heart.

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With a new dread, I realized yesterday that we will never sing our song again. That thought makes me feel sick. We met last year in Berlin to sing together. I didn't know that would be our last time.

Joe won my heart completely when I first saw the movie Woodstock. He won millions of hearts with that film. But it was a young girl's dream come true to later become Joe’s singing partner.

I will always love him and always miss him.

Jennifer Warnes and Joe Cocker's 1982 collaboration "Up Where We Belong" for the film An Officer And a Gentleman won an Oscar, a Golden Globe and netted them both the Grammy Award for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal. It also topped the Billboard Hot 100.