A transvestite who always sings at weddings and graduations

Did you know that there is a transvestite who sings at almost every wedding, at almost every graduation? That while your aunt descends to the floor with her crepe dress full of beaded appliqués and your uncle ties his tie on his head, meanwhile, a black transvestite with drooling is there, in the air, singing, getting everyone to dance for at least 50 years.

Sylvester James (Los Angeles, September 6, 1947 — San Francisco, December 16, 1988) is her name. “You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)” is the hit that spanned decades, making up every good dance playlist worth its salt – straight or not. Because one of the greatest powers that this wonderful woman carries – even though she is on another plane – is precisely to cross borders, to be a point of exception in the standard.

It made a transition accompanied by the public, by the media, even at a time when the subject was almost folklore – the means of transacting, technologies, treatments, were not so varied. But overcoming challenges such as transphobia was a Sylvestrin power as great as her voice.

She loved to sing in falsetto and is the owner of super-hyper-mega danceable songs. That hit from weddings and graduations is just one of them, it serves as the tip of a delicious iceberg of tracks that the modernity of the internet has placed online. It’s to get lost, press play, forget any established order – in the playlist and in life.

What a black transvestite could do in the 70s and 80s wasn’t much, but Sylvester stretched the rope, broadened the perspective and today is considered one of the most important artists of her time. Essential for disco music, a reference for transvestites, complete proof of the power that was fortunately growing in the African-American community.

A pride in his roots reflected in album covers that are, to this day, true works of art. They reflect the exuberance and striking features of a personality that was out of step with the still very white and cis music industry.

But a danger of this success all around danceable hits like “You Make” (number 1 on the Billboard club hits) and the perfect “Don’t Stop”, “Stars”, “Trouble In Paradise” and “Won’t You Let Me Love You”, in addition to the naughty “Do You Wanna Funk?”, this disco buzz hides an even more commendable side of Sylvester: his slower songs, with greater doses of feeling and generous pinches of interpretation.

When she sings without the commitment of “dance, bitch!” It is magnanimity. It’s that kind of masterpiece that no time can erase, no era can diminish. It’s there, as an example of vocal strength, as a standard of delivery to the microphone. Listen to “I Need Somebody To Love Tonight” and try to resist. Impossible.

Sylvester changed his spiritual stage on December 16, 1988, at the age of 41, due to AIDS. “I do not believe that AIDS is the wrath of God. People have a tendency to blame God for everything,” he said.