The late New York-born singer-songwriter whose songs were covered by such artists as Barbra Streisand, Blood Sweat & Tears, Peter Paul & Mary and the Fifth Dimension, was always drawn to socially conscious songs, she said. A vegetarian, her “Lite A Flame (The Animal Rights Song)” — which begins “In the zoo, they gave him a cage” — appears on 1993’s Walk The Dog and Light the Light, and disc 2 of 1997’s Stoned Soul Picnic: The Best of Laura Nyro. She died that year of ovarian cancer at age 49. Buy the song here — K.B.