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STORMIN’ NORMAN WHITFIELD!
One by one the Motown legends are leaving us. Norman Whitfield, producer and songwriter of many of the Motown hits that are still on the airwaves today with regularity, died from complications of diabetes on Tuesday September 16th at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.
Detroit Free Press Pop Music Writer, Brian McCollum described Whitfield’s Motown contribution as helping to “push Motown beyond the sweet melodies and puppy-love tales of its early days into edgier, more expansive sounds.” When I read that, I wondered if readers, especially the generation that came after the Motown “Heyday” would understand what that meant. I hope this will help.
In early 1966 I watched the Temptations debut their new hit single “Get Ready” written by the legendary Smokey Robinson. Up to that point, Robinson was the exclusive producer on the “Tempts” with songs like “The Way You Do The Things You Do”; “My Girl”; It’s Growing”; “Don’t Look Back”; and “Since I Lost My Baby”. Those songs were phenomenal. The musical and vocal arrangements were so innocent; so personal; and the Tempts were like the background music for a Black version of the comic book characters Archie & Veronica. Listen to them sing Smokey’s “What Love Has Joined Together” and you’ll get the idea. Well after watching the group sing “Get Ready” on TV that night, I was so taken by what I had heard and seen that I could not sleep, and I believe that’s what really got me thinking seriously about songwriting.
A few months later however, the Tempts came out with a new record called “Ain’t Too Proud To Beg”; and when I first heard it I thought, “hey what’s happening here…these are not my Temptations!” I really couldn’t stand the song. It sounded like they had just walked out of our comfortable living room, and took to the streets! It was like I didn’t know them anymore; that they were abandoning us; but then…it grabbed me! The tension in that song helped me define the teenage turmoil I was experiencing at the time. Norman Whitfield had grabbed the baton from Smokey Robinson, and taken the Tempts to a new level!
I was always one to read the credits on the records (‘45’s we called them then), and one name that kept coming up on the string of hits to follow – “Beauty’s Only Skin Deep”; I’m Losin’ You; and “Wish It Would Rain” etc. - was “Whitfield”. And it appeared in various combinations with a list of names like Barrett Strong; Cornelius Grant; Roger Penzabene; Eddie Holland; Janie Bradford; and others. It was a very impressive line-up looking back on the discographies. Whitfield could take an already great song into a whole different realm. Listen again to the transformation of the Tempts’ version of “Too Busy Thinkin’ ‘Bout My Baby, into the superb Marvin Gaye version; or Gladys Knight and the Pips’ version of “Heard It Through The Grapevine” that became a Marvin Gaye mega-hit! It was masterful!
Although Mr. Whitfield had many, many more successes, I wanted to emphasize a little more his contribution to the great historic Motown sound. God bless him, and may he rest in peace.
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