Amazing Grace (Aretha Franklin album)
| Amazing Grace | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Live album by Aretha Franklin | ||||
| Released | June 1, 1972 | |||
| Recorded | January 13–14, 1972 | |||
| Genre | Gospel, soul | |||
| Length | 85:43 | |||
| Label | Atlantic (#2-906), Rhino | |||
| Producer | Jerry Wexler, Arif Mardin, Aretha Franklin | |||
| Aretha Franklin chronology | ||||
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| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic |   |
| Robert Christgau | B+ |
| Rolling Stone | favourable |
Amazing Grace is the third live album by American singer Aretha Franklin. Released on June 1, 1972 by Atlantic Records, it ultimately sold over two million copies in the United States alone, earning a double platinum certification. As of 2015, it stands as the biggest selling disc of Franklin's entire fifty-plus year recording career as well as the highest selling live gospel music album of all time. It later went on to win Franklin the 1973 Grammy Award for Best Soul Gospel Performance.
The double album was recorded at the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles during January 1972. A film documenting the making of the album was set to be released in 1972, but was shelved by Warner Bros. Amazing Grace was remastered and re-released in 1999 as a two-compact disc set with many unreleased takes.
Amazing Grace, a documentary/concert film directed by Sydney Pollack for Warner Bros., was set to be released as part of a double bill with Super Fly in 1972. However, Pollack was unable to complete the film because he had not used a clapperboard to synchronize the picture and sound at the beginning of each take. The film ended up in the studio vaults for over 38 years. Before Pollack's death in 2008, he turned the footage over to producer Alan Elliott, who after two years succeeded in synchronizing the picture and sound and completing the film.
Elliott first planned to release the film in 2011, but was prevented from doing so when Franklin sued him for using her likeness without permission. However, Franklin's original contract for the film was later discovered at Warner Bros., and Elliott planned to show the film at the Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival, and Chicago International Film Festival in 2015. Franklin once again sued and was granted an emergency injunction against the Telluride screening, saying she had not given permission to screen the footage. Franklin issued a statement saying, "Justice, respect and what is right prevailed and one’s right to own their own self-image." Due to the ongoing litigation, the film was then removed from the schedules of both the Chicago and Toronto festivals as well.
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