Cissy Houston, singer and mother of Whitney Houston, dies at 91

Cissy Houston, famend gospel singer and the mom of Whitney Houston, died on Monday morning on the age of 91, her household mentioned in an announcement.

Houston, a two-time Grammy Award successful singer, died in her New Jersey house whereas in hospice look after Alzheimer’s illness, her daughter-in-law Pat Houston mentioned.

“Our hearts are crammed with ache and disappointment. We misplaced the matriarch of our household,” she mentioned, including that her mother-in-law was a “sturdy and towering determine” within the household’s life.

Houston loved a decades-long profitable singing profession, the place she carried out alongside superstars like Elvis Presley and Aretha Franklin.

Born in New Jersey in 1933, Houston was the youngest of eight kids. She started singing at a younger age after she fashioned a gospel group along with her siblings.

Within the Nineteen Sixties, she fashioned the R&B group the Candy Inspirations, which sang backup for giant names like Otis Redding, Dusty Springfield and Dionne Warwick. In addition they carried out on Van Morrison’s hit music Brown Eyed Lady.

After discovering success with the Candy Inspirations, Houston launched into a solo profession, the place she sang with artists together with Chaka Khan, Jimi Hendrix, Beyonce, Paul Simon, and her late daughter Whitney Houston, who died in 2012 at age 48.

Houston gained a Grammy Award for her conventional soul gospel album Face to Face in 1997, and once more the next 12 months for her album He Leadeth Me.

She additionally wrote three books, together with one commemorating her daughter, known as Remembering Whitney: A Mom’s Story of Life, Loss and The Night time The Music Stopped.

On the age of 80, Houston sang as soon as once more with Aretha Franklin throughout her efficiency on The Late Present with David Letterman, the place they carried out a canopy of Adele’s Rolling within the Deep.

Her daughter-in-law, Pat, mentioned that Houston’s “greater than seven-decade profession in music and leisure will stay on the forefront of our hearts”.

She added that the household is “blessed and grateful that God allowed her to spend so a few years with us”.

“Could she relaxation in peace, alongside her daughter, Whitney and granddaughter Bobbi Kristina and different cherished members of the family.”