Aretha Franklin died at 9:50 am at home, surrounded by family and friends, according to a statement on behalf of Franklin's family from her longtime publicist Gwendolyn Quinn. The family statement said, "official cause of death was due to advance pancreatic cancer of the neuroendocrine type." Franklin, a 17-time Grammy Award-winner, was diagnosed with cancer in 2010, and delivered her last performance at the Elton John AIDS Foundation party in New York, last November.

"In one of the darkest moments of our lives, we are not able to find the appropriate words to express the pain in our heart. We have lost the matriarch and rock of our family. The love she had for her children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, and cousins knew no bounds," said Franklin's family.