Greatest Hits (1980-1994) - Franklin, Aretha (CD 1994)

I really enjoyed this collection. I am huge Aretha fan and find the three new tracks just wonderful. They gave us a chance to have some new material since her 1991 Arista release "What You See Is What You Sweat" album. The album centers on hits from her 1980 Arista debut "Aretha", 1982's awesome "Jump To It", her platinum 1985 "Who's Zoomin' Who" and the aforementioned 1991 release. This collection will give the music lover unfamiliar with her Arista work, and idea of the music she produced during this period. I am sure it would be hard to narrow it down to the choices for this first collection of hits, as much of the work from the albums from 1980-1994 show the Soul Queen able to tackle just about any type of genre. There are two tracks, one from her 1993 TV special "Duets" where she visits a hit from Atlantic Records back in 1968 with Gloria Estefan and Bonnie Raitt joining Aretha in singing "Natural Woman" - pure magic to hear these other two ladies give their own special stamp to an Aretha classic. A surprise was hearing Edward James Olmos' introduction of Aretha at Clinton's inaugural celebration to sing "I Dreamed a Dream" from Les Miserabe as he is quoted proclaiming Aretha being a Washington DC school teacher, but is known more familiar as the Queen of Soul. Can't wait for volume 2!