Dusty Springfield

English singer Dusty Springfield released one of the most acclaimed albums of all time with her 1969 LP Dusty in Memphis, the crowning achievement of a career that included 21 studio albums and 69 singles, including 16 Top 20 hits in her native UK and six in the US.

• Springfield got her start in the late ’50s singing in groups with her brother Tom and in the pop vocal trio The Lana Sisters. Her 1963 solo debut single “I Only Want to Be with You”, reached No. 4 in the UK and No. 12 in the US.
• Her fifth single, 1964’s “I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself”, helped establish Springfield’s signature style, pairing her powerful voice with a dramatic musical arrangement complete with strings. The song hit No. 3 in the UK.
• Springfield’s first No. 1 hit—and most successful single—came in 1966 with “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me”. The song, an English version of an Italian song, topped the charts in the UK and reached No. 4 in the US.
• Though she continued landing hits in the US and the UK, Springfield went to Memphis in 1968 looking for a career boost amid the burgeoning counterculture. Working with Atlantic Records heavyweights Jerry Wexler and Arif Mardin, Springfield blended her pop instincts with a Southern soul aesthetic on 11 songs for Dusty in Memphis.
• The first single from Dusty in Memphis, 1968’s “Son of a Preacher Man”, was her last Top 10 hit for nearly 20 years. The song anchored the soundtrack to the 1994 film Pulp Fiction, introducing Springfield to a younger generation of listeners.
• Springfield returned to prominence when she sang on “What Have I Done to Deserve This”, a 1987 hit by the English electronic duo Pet Shop Boys. The song peaked at No. 2 in the UK and the US.
• Her 1995 album A Very Fine Love was the last album Springfield released during her lifetime. She died in 1999 of breast cancer and was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame that same year. Faithful, an album Springfield had recorded in 1971 but never released, came out posthumously in 2015.