She started in Detroit while she was still in high school, singing with friends under names that did not yet belong to history. They called themselves the Del-Phis, then the Vels. They sang behind bigger stars first, including Marvin Gaye and Mary Wells, until a label founder heard what they already knew about their own sound. After one member left, the remaining voices became a trio. The records that followed did not sound like background work. They sounded like summer coming through an open window.

In 1963 the first national hit arrived, then a bigger one the same year, a heat-wave song that climbed the pop chart and earned a Grammy nomination. Another single followed so quickly that radio barely had time to cool down. The next summer they cut the record that made them unforgettable: a street-dance anthem that reached No. 2 and later traveled through other artists’ mouths, from folk-rock singers to a hard-rock cover that introduced the groove to a new generation. Other titles stayed on the air beside it: a song about having nowhere to run, another about being ready for love, another named after a man who would not stay gone.

She left the group in 1969 and took ordinary work at the telephone company while still returning to the stage with former partners when the songs called her back. In 1995 the trio was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, only the second all-female group given that place. She is survived by her son and four grandchildren. The woman who shared the microphone in those first years said the recordings would keep the voice in the room, and that the Motown family had grown a little smaller.

The name held until the last line is Rosalind Ashford. Original Vandellas soprano. Detroit. The records remain louder than the quiet that follows.