Aretha Franklin, the former gospel singer

Aretha Franklin, the former gospel singer who went on to reign over the music industry as the Queen of Soul with hit songs such as “Respect,” “Chain of Fools” and “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman,” has died. She was 76.

Franklin died Thursday of pancreatic cancer at her home in Detroit, according to the Associated Press. In March, Franklin canceled a scheduled tour for medical reasons. Her last known performance was in November at Elton John’s annual AIDS Foundation gala.

In Detroit on Aug. 13, Beyonce dedicated her performance with her husband, Jay Z, to the ailing soul singer, thanking Franklin for her “beautiful music.”

The daughter of a Baptist minister, Franklin incorporated black church music, blues and jazz to forge “a contemporary synthesis that spoke to the younger generation in the new language of soul,” according to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, which in 1987 made her the first female inductee.

Through four decades, Franklin was a regular on Billboard magazine’s hit lists. She had 17 top 10 songs and 22 top 40 albums. Twenty songs and 10 albums reached No. 1 on Billboard’s R&B/Hip-Hop lists.

She won 18 Grammy Awards, plus two honorary ones for her lifetime of work. In 2008, Rolling Stone named her the greatest singer of all time based on a survey of 179 producers, musicians and others. Time magazine in 2010 named her one of the 25 most powerful women of the past century.

‘A Gift’
“Aretha is a gift from God,” Mary J. Blige wrote for Rolling Stone. “When it comes to expressing yourself through song, there is no one who can touch her. She is the reason why women want to sing.”

Her signature song, “Respect,” spent two weeks as the No. 1 song in the U.S. in 1967 and became an anthem for women’s rights -- “R-E-S-P-E-C-T, find out what it means to me” --even though it was written and originally sung by a man, Otis Redding. She reached No. 1 two decades later, with “I Knew You Were Waiting,” a duet with George Michael in 1987.

“If a song’s about something I’ve experienced or that could’ve happened to me, it’s good,” she told Time for a 1968 cover story. “But if it’s alien to me, I couldn’t lend anything to it. Because that’s what soul is about -- just living and having to get along.”