Singer Linda Lewis Dead at 72

Linda Lewis, the British singer who scored a hit with her 1975 cover of “Shoop Shoop Song (It’s In His Kiss)” and was famous for her five-octave range, has died. She was 72. Lewis’s sister, Dee Lewis Clay, shared the sad news on Facebook Wednesday.

“It is with the greatest sadness and regret we share the news that our beloved beautiful sister Linda Lewis passed away today peacefully at her home,” Lewis Clay wrote. “The family asks that you respect our privacy and allow us to grieve at this heartbreaking time.” She did not share a cause of death.

Lewis was born Linda Ann Fredericks on Sept. 27, 1950, in West Ham, England to a jazz singer and a pharmacist. While attending stage school, she had a non-speaking role in the 1961 drama A Taste of Honey and played a screaming fan in The Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night. After she performed “Dancing in the Street” with blues singer John Lee Hooker at a club, he introduced her to her first manager. She scored a record deal with Polydor, where she first used her professional name, Linda Lewis.

The singer failed to find success until the early 1970s when she signed with Warner Bros. Records’ Reprise label. In 1973, she finally scored her first hit single with “Rock-a-Doodle-Doo.” Following an international tour with Yusuf/Cat Stevens, Lewis released her smash hit album, Not a Little Girl Anymore. The 1975 record included her hit covers of “Shoop Shoop Song (It’s In His Kiss)” and “This Time I’ll Be Sweeter,” and the Stevens-written “(Remember the Days of) The Old Schoolyard.” Lewis also worked as a session vocalist in the early 1970s, working with Stevens, Al Kooper, David Bowie, and Hummingbird.

After releasing three more albums between 1977 and 1983, Lewis rarely performed in public. She returned to music in 1995 with Second Nature, which led to a successful international tour and a live album. In 2002, Warner Bros. Records released a compilation of her work, Reach for the Truth: The Best of the Reprise Years. In 2005, Common used a portion of her song “Old Smokey” in his hit 2005 single “Go!” Lewis also released a five-disc box set, Funky Bubbles, in 2017.

The music community mourned Lewis’ death on social media, including Stevens. “I’m so sorry to hear of Linda Lewis’ passing. She was a good soul friend and fine artist. Her flat on Hampstead Way was a regular home for [artists] and musicians in the 70’s,” the singer wrote in part. “I’m so sad to hear of the death of Linda Lewis. She had a beautiful voice and was a really lovely person. RIP Linda,” singer Joan Armatrading wrote.