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Grateful Dead, (left to right) Mickey Hart, Phil Lesh, Donna Godchaux, Keith Godchaux (seated), Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzman, ca. 1970s. (Courtesy Everett Collection, Inc.)

At the beginning of her singing career, Donna Jean Thatcher would often rush from cheerleader practice - still in her cheerleader uniform - to record demos at Fame and Quinvy recording studios.

After graduating from Sheffield High School in 1965, Thatcher began contributing background vocals to several landmark recordings. Percy Sledge's sublime 1966 ballad "When a Man Loves a Woman." Elvis Presley's soaring 1969 single "Suspicious Minds." Both were number one hits. Her Muscle Shoals and Memphis session work also included recordings by Neil Diamond, Cher, Boz Scaggs, Joe Tex, Dionne Warwick, Ben E. King, among others. After moving to California, Thatcher married keyboardist Keith Godchaux in 1970 and then in 1972 Mr and Mrs. Godchaux (pronounced "god show") joined improvisation rock band the Grateful Dead, and the couple performed and recorded with that group until 1979.

"I have just been fortunate enough to have been in the right place at the right time," Donna Jean says. "Number one in Muscle Shoals and number two in San Francisco where they just happened to be looking for a keyboard player and Keith [who passed away in 1980] became the keyboard player and then I joined the band as a singer. I've always appreciated what I call both arms of who I am musically. I'm very much Muscle Shoals and very appreciative of that deep groove that Muscle Shoals is so famous for, and then I'm so appreciative of the other arm of my musical life that is jam-band, Grateful Dead-inspired music."

On Friday, Donna Jean will be inducted into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame. Fellow 2016 inductees include Rolling Stones keyboardist Chuck Leavell, producer Johnny Sandlin, Southern rockers Wet Willie and session musicians the Muscle Shoals Horns.

On a recent afternoon, Donna Jean called in for this phone interview from the upstairs bedroom of her Florence home.

Donna Jean, are you writing out your Alabama Music Hall of Fame induction speech in advance or are you going to wing it?

Well, all I'm really doing is just highlighting some things I don't to miss saying, just cryptically. I'm not really writing out the speech.

When you got the news, who was the very first person you told?

Oh, my husband (and Donna Jean Godchaux Band guitarist) David MacKay.

His reaction?

Well he was very happy. We've been back in the Shoals area for over 20 years and have been a part of the music scene here as well so he was just very happy. And congratulated his wife. [Laughs.]

The day you sang background vocals on "When a Man Loves a Woman" did you have any idea it would be one of those songs that lives forever?

Well, I was best friends with Jeanie Greene and her husband Marlin Greene. Jeanie was the leader of the voice group we eventually called Southern Comfort and Marlin produced "When a Man Loves a Woman" [with Quin Ivy.] And so I as in the studio constantly and it was just a big thrill that "When a Man Loves a Woman" became number one in the nation. As a matter of fact, I remember when that happened. Percy was in the hospital and Jeanie and I took a Billboard magazine into the hospital into his room and showed him that "When a Man Loves a Woman" was number one. So you just play music and you do what you do and what you love and know, but you never know when you're going to be part of history. A historical thing that stays in people's minds and hearts and iPads and everything that everybody has, that they still listen to these many years later. So it was a thrill for all of us when "When a Man Loves a Woman" was such a big hit.

I read that during recording sessions for "Suspicious Minds," Elvis Presley listened to each background singer separately and critiqued them. Do you remember the feedback Elvis gave you?

You know I don't remember that he really dwelt on giving distinct personal critique or anything. He just listened to our voices, individually.

What was it like being in the studio with such a charismatic singer?

Oh my gosh. It was one of the most amazing times of my life. I had gone to see "Love Me Tender" when I was either nine or 10 and everybody in the audience was screaming. But he was so kind to us and encouraging and complimentary, it was a wonderful time. He was a gentleman to the highest degree. And he looked great.

I was going to ask if he was that handsome in person.

I'm telling you, he was the most gorgeous human being I've ever seen, male or female - he was just unreal looking. Much better looking than any picture or any movie.

The earliest memory you have of singing really resonating with you?

I was singing from pretty much as soon as I could talk. I remember very distinctly when I was six years old, I knew I was going to be a singer and I would sit out on my back porch and sing to the top of my lungs every day. And it so happened that our next door neighbor, my dad was in the Army so we were on an Army base, I believe it was Ft. Knox, Kentucky, and the major who lived next door his sister was an opera singer on "The Firestone Hour" and she heard me singing out on the back porch every day and so she came to my parents and she said, "You need to get her into voice lessons right away because she could be a really good opera singer." Of course that never happened. [Laughs.] But I always wanted to sing and I knew that's what I was going to do ... I just knew it.

So what sort of songs were you singing on that back porch at age six?

Just the normal things that were on the radio at that time. Kay Starr. Jo Stafford. Those kinds of singers. And the thing that I would do even when I was that young, I would keep listening to the songs when they came on the radio and learn the melody and when the song came on again, I would start learning a harmony part. And by the time the song had played on the radio a few times I had learned all three harmony parts. I just grew up hearing harmonies.

Of all those '70s Grateful Dead tours when you were in the band, which do you think was the best musically? Or the Dead tour you enjoyed the most?

That's a hard question to answer because to tell you the truth we toured so much and played so many hockey rinks and everything, we would sometimes not even remember where we were so it's hard to pinpoint a concert or series of concerts of concerts.

However, having said that, we loved doing the European tours. They were just wonderful and of course very exotic and totally different for us as far as the kind of venues we played and whatnot - we played a lot of really, really nice theaters that were built for music and that was a real treat because once the Grateful Dead got so big we were playing 50,000-seat stadiums and all of that. And stadiums are meant for sports not music. [Laughs.] And so it was always a challenge to sound good in those arenas.

The other thing that of course stands out are the three concerts we did in Egypt in front of the Great Pyramid. Those were really exciting, fulfilling deep times and we had a blast in Egypt. We just had so much fun. Not only were there the concerts we did and the venue was filled to capacity, we took a three-day trip down the Nile on a private boat and that was just one of the most glorious experiences of my life. It was amazing.

Your vocal ad-libs during the outro of the studio version of "Scarlet Begonias" on Grateful Dead's 1974 "From the Mars Hotel" sound really cool. What do you recall about recording those?

Well sometimes those ad libs were really good, sometimes I couldn't hear myself and it was weird but still it was fun - and especially to do it on the record. On the record, I could hear everything and it was pristine. The atmosphere for me in the studio, that was my wheelhouse - I'd been in the studio so much it was easier for me to sing in my normal voice. Live the band was so loud, so much equipment and we had these little monitors [the speakers performers use to hear themselves onstage] up front so it took me a while to learn how to navigate singing live, because I was a studio singer. So I did the best I could singing in front of one of the loudest bands in the world. [Laughs.] But it was great fun. I loved singing with those guys and we had an absolute blast.

The '70s were so prolific. (Dead lyricist Robert) Hunter and (Dead guitarists Jerry) Garcia and Weir and (Dead lyricist John Perry) Barlow, their best years and they just exploded with new material. And so just imagine walking into the rehearsal studio and Jerry playing "Scarlet Begonias" for the first time for the band. Or name any of those songs. It was just amazing.

A lot of people love Jerry Garcia's guitar playing, singing and music. What was he like offstage?

He was perhaps the most intelligent person that I've ever been around and he was very conscious and he really taught me how to get out of myself and reach for something that is other than just what is your normal fare, daily living. He really taught me so much more than anyone ever. Not only about music but about life and it's hard to even talk about, but the other thing that was so unique about Jerry was he was one of the most generous musicians I've ever been around. I sat for years and watched him be so kind and giving to other guitar players or just other people that would come and want to speak to him. He had that kind of big-hearted generosity that he freely gave to anybody and everybody. He was amazing. He's one of the best humans that I've ever known. [Laughs.]

Do you bring back any mementos from the Grateful Dead's Egypt shows that you still have today?

Oh, absolutely. I've got several necklaces. I brought back a cartouche that said "Donna Jean" on it in hieroglyphs. I brought back three dresses, two of which were in the Grateful Dead exhibit at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and one is in the Alabama Music Hall of Fame.

You were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1994 with the Grateful Dead and the Alabama Music Hall of Fame this year. How do those two honors compare for you?

Of course they're both an incredible honor. Being in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is something a small portion of musicians get to be inducted into, that's an incredible thing. And being inducted into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame has a little bit more meaning for me in that there's nothing better than being acknowledged by your home state and by your peers from when you grew up. Here we are lo these many years later and we're still friends and still playing music together. There's nothing like that. It's deep. It's way deep with those roots. So I'm very, very honored.

What's next for you musically?

We, the Donna Jean Godchaux Band recorded our last album at Nutthouse Recording Studio here in Muscle Shoals and so it was a great treat to come back here and it's the best solo work, the best solo album I've ever record.

The "Back Around" album, from 2014, right?

Yes, "Back Around." I'm not going to tour any more, I'm done with that but I do special concerts with friends of mine, for instance in April I'm playing the New Orleans Jazz Festival with some friends of mine from California (the band Axis Tilt). And I'll do special things, like it's always fun for me to sit-in with the Dark Star Orchestra. I will probably record some more but I'm done with the spending weeks on the road. [Laughs.]

I found the entire Keith & Donna album on YouTube. Is that album maybe a lost treasure more people should seek out from your career? It's a cool album.

It is cool. It was recorded in our home studio in Stinson Beach, California and Garcia was there and played on most of it, all of it I guess. It was just a very organic thing. The only song on there I think Keith and I didn't write was "River Deep and Mountain High" and it was some of the songs that ended up on the "Keith & Donna" album that when we met Jerry, Keith and I had a reel-to-reel tape player that we had recorded a couple of the demos of the songs and those were the songs we played Jerry the first that we met with him. And that's when he really wanted me to sing with the band. So the "Keith & Donna" album is very obscure and it's not perfect at all but it's very cool and real.

What do you strive for when you sing or do you just clear your mind and go for it?

Well what I try and bring to any vocal that I do is something that is real and authentic to me and my voice and something I'm feeling with my hear, my spirit and hopefully that is something that translates to the listener. I think if you start from that point you've got a pretty good thing going. If you try to sound like someone else and it's not you it's going to fall flat and it's not going to be authentic. That's something I reach for every time: for my voice to be as clear and real as possible.