You go girl! The Queen of Soul Aretha Franklin continues to wow audiences with her new, slimmer physique as she performed in Nashville, Tennessee’s Ryman Auditorium yesterday evening.
Although the 69-year old singer remained largely hidden behind her lengthy, white tunic gown; her weight loss was evident.
Franklin certainly had reasons to adjust her diet as the Natural Woman singer was reportedly diagnosed with pancreatic cancer earlier this year. According to The Daily Mail, these claims were later denied as Aretha addressed the rumors with the following statement;
“There were just so many wild things out there and just so many things being said that weren’t true… I just felt I needed to address it a little. I don’t know where pancreatic cancer came from, she states. I was sitting there reading the newspaper and it was saying someone in my family said that.”
She continued by adding;
“No one in my family ever said that to anybody.”
Franklin did however undergo an “unidentified” surgery this past December which caused her to cancel concerts and personal appearances up until May.
After this surgery Franklin began to rapidly lose weight as her more than 300lb frame appeared to loose inches daily. This of course prompted rumors that she underwent gastric bypass surgery which Aretha vehemently denied in a recent interview with talk show host Wendy Williams earlier this year;
“Definitely not, and would not. I heard that rumor. I said, ‘That is crazy.’ It definitely was not the bariatric or, what is it, gastric… Yeah, I can’t even tell you the correct name of it.”
Although Franklin did not clarify the nature of her health concerns, she did mention that her doctors believed the surgery would add 15 to 20 more years to her life.
If her appearance at the MLK Memorial tribute in DC earlier this week and Nashville on Thursday night was any indication, Ms. Aretha Franklin will be around for some time. 🙂
