Klaasen has been awarded South Africa's Order of the Baobab in Gold for "excellent achievement in and contribution to the art of Music".
Lorraine Klaasen was influenced by South Africa’s musical giants of the 1950s and 1960s, such as Miriam Makeba, Dolly Rathebe, Dorothy Masuka, Sophie Mgcina and Busi Mhlongo, contemporaries and friends of her mother, Thandi Klaasen.