From Vandross: Love And Laughs

This week, a tribute album hit the record stores. It's called "So Amazing," and it has some of R&B's biggest stars, including Patti LaBelle, Mary J. Blige, Aretha Franklin, Usher, Beyonce, Alicia Keys and more singing the songs Luther Vandross made famous.

Vandross died in July at the age of 54, having never really recovered from a stroke he suffered two years ago. Recently, The Early Show co-anchor Rene Syler got the opportunity to sit down with his mother, Mary Vandross, to talk about her memories and his music.

"I lost my last son, my last child," Mary Vandross said. "He was the baby of four. I lost a very good friend, someone that I could talk with and who understood me."

Like many of his fans, Syler was stunned to hear about his death because there had been indications that he was getting better.

"Believe me when I say it is as much a shock to me as it is to anyone," Mary Vandross said. "But about three weeks before his death, I went to visit him and when I got ready to leave there was a difference. It was very strange, and I called his manager and I said, 'You know, I think I'm losing my son.' "

Asked what she thinks of when she hears his music, Mary Vandross said, "I like remembering when he was coming into his music and how he shocked me. I knew that he loved music because you could make him clean the house like an electric maid if you tell him you were going to buy him a record."

Now with the album, "So Amazing," she thinks of the love her son shared with all the people playing tribute to him.

"What I think is about all the love he had for these people, these people have turned around and gave the love back to him. And that's why I know that when you give love, you get love," Mary Vandross said. "He left a legacy. I was teasing somebody, I said, 'You know, his sisters and his brother got married and they had children, and their children had children; they left a legacy. My son left more children then any of them. Everybody everywhere will remember him. He left a legacy that you can hear.' "

With his 1990 single, "Here And Now," Grammy Award-winner Patti LaBelle paid tribute to her friend on The Early Show. She told Syler about the first time she met him backstage at the Apollo in the '60s.

"He pretended to be a designer and he had an outfit for my group. And he got through," LaBelle said. "I said, 'You are so good, that was a good lie. You deserve to be in our presence,' so he became our first fan club president. Since then, he'd been like buddy. He's like a brother."

LaBelle said that what she misses the most about Luther are his jokes.

"His mother is very much like that, so clever," she says. "They're fun people. He liked to play tricks on people, including me."

He also enjoyed dressing the women in his life, LaBelle said.

"He loves to buy his ladies clothes — me and his background singers, his mother," she says. "She has a house full of stuff that Luther bought her. And he bought me a Versace, beautiful outfit … But they would never fit me. He would make me put it on anyway. I said: Luther, I'm not going out in it. I'll try it on for you. Now you can have it back. Put it in the closet for the next girl."

When LaBelle found out he passed away, she said she was at peace.

"I wanted Luther to do what he needed to do," LaBelle says. "I think he was in such pain and not wanting his mother to see him that way. I said to myself, I think he just wants to go home."