Libby Titus, Introspective Singer and Songwriter, Dies at 77

Libby Titus, a singer-songwriter known for her wistful ballad “Love Has No Pride,” covered by Linda Ronstadt and Bonnie Raitt, and for her collaborations with the likes of Burt Bacharach, Dr. John and her husband, Donald Fagen of Steely Dan, died on Oct. 13. She was 77.

Mr. Fagen announced her death on the Steely Dan website, but he did not cite a cause or say where she died.

A highly regarded songwriter and backup vocalist in the 1970s, Ms. Titus never scaled the commercial heights as a solo artist. Still, she garnered critical praise for her first and only major-label album, called simply “Libby Titus” and released by Columbia Records in 1977, on which she was backed by an all-star cast of friends, including Paul Simon, Robbie Robertson of the Band, James Taylor and Carly Simon. Ms. Simon wrote or co-wrote four of the tracks.

A showcase for Ms. Titus’s jazz leanings and her taste for torch songs, the album “immediately distinguishes her from the Hollywood cowgirls of the Ronstadt regiment,” the influential rock critic Dave Marsh wrote in a review for Rolling Stone. She is “a sophisticated pop singer,” he added, “closer to Bette Midler than anyone else.”

The album included her version of “Love Has No Pride,” a heart-rending song about lost love and longing, written with her childhood friend Eric Kaz. Stephen Holden, reviewing a performance by Ms Titus for The New York Times in 1983, called it “one of the finest ballads of the rock era.”