Whether singing, playing guitar, or crafting smooth-sailing hits like Jack and Jill, The other
Woman or You Can’t Change That, Ray Parker
Jr. made success look easy. But behind the
show-biz façade, Parker was an obsessive
musician a guitarist who’d cut his teeth with
Motown’s house band, the Funk brothers, as a
teenager, and later played with Stevie Wonder
and Barry White. Long before his emergence as a headliner,
he’d written hits for Barry White and Chaka Khan,
while crafting a Grammy winning single for Leo
Sayer - You Make Me Feel Like Dancing – for
which he never received credit, a hard lesson
in business. All of which was just a prelude to
Parker’s own Grammy winning triumph with
Ghostbusters – and the controversy which
followed, in which he stood accused of
plagiarizing someone else’s hit. A double-dose of baby mama drama, family
loss, and an ill-advised decision to leave his
safe haven at Arista Records accelerated his
descent from the top of the charts. But Ray
Parker proved unsinkable, and along with
testimony from his extended musical family
including Cheryl Lynn, Chaka Khan and Clive
Davis - he tells Unsung the tale of his still
unfolding journey.
Born May 3, 1933, Barnwell, S.C., American
singer, songwriter, arranger, and dancer, who
was one of the most important and influential
entertainers in 20th-century popular music and
whose remarkable achievements earned him
the sobriquet “the Hardest-Working Man in
Show Business.”
Brown was raised mainly in Augusta, Ga., by
his great-aunt, who took him in at about the
age of five. Growing
up in the segregated South during the Great
Depression of the 1930s, Brown was so
impoverished that he was sent home from
grade school for “insufficient clothes,” an
experience that he never forgot and that
perhaps explains his penchant as an adult for
wearing ermine coats, velour jumpsuits,
elaborate capes, and conspicuous gold
jewelry. Neighbors taught him how to play
drums, piano, and guitar, and he learned about
gospel music in churches and at tent revivals,
where preachers would scream, yell, stomp
their feet, and fall to their knees during
sermons to provoke responses from the
congregation. Brown sang for his classmates
and competed in local talent shows but initially
thought more about a career in baseball or
boxing than in music.
While at the Alto Reform School, he formed a
gospel group. Subsequently secularized and
renamed the Flames (later the Famous
Flames), it soon attracted the attention of
rhythm-and-blues and rock-and-roll shouter
Little Richard, whose manager helped promote
the group. Intrigued by their demo record,
Ralph Bass, the artists-and-repertoire man for
the King label, brought the group to Cincinnati,
Ohio, to record for King Records subsidiary
Federal. The label's owner, Syd Nathan, hated
Brown's first recording, “Please, Please, Please” (1956), but the record eventually sold
three million copies and launched Brown's
extraordinary career. Along with placing nearly
100 singles and almost 50 albums on the
best-seller charts, Brown broke new ground
with two of the first successful “live and in
concert” albums—his landmark Live at the
Apollo (1963), which stayed on the charts for
66 weeks, and his 1964 follow-up, Pure
Dynamite! Live at the Royal, which charted for
22 weeks.
Janet Damita Jo Jackson) was born on May 16,
1966 in Gary, Indiana Janet Jackson first appeared on stage in April
1974, singing and doing impressions
alongside her brother Randy in the Jackson
family's Las Vegas act. In 1976, she appeared
on The Jacksons, a summer replacement
television show. Her performance earned her
the attention of a producer who hired her to
play Penny, a regular on the TV comedy series
Good Times, from 1977-79. She continued her
television work in the short-lived A New Kind of
Family (1979-80), the sitcom Different Strokes
(1981-2), and the teen drama Fame (1984-5),
based at a New York City performing arts high
school. Unlike many of her siblings, Janet Jackson
attended public school in Encino, California,
for some time before switching to Valley
Professional School, from which she
graduated in 1984. During her time on Fame,
she was able to break away from her family's
supervision while on location in New York.
With the guidance of her brother Michael, she
released her debut album Janet Jackson, in
1982. The album reached No. 84 on the pop
charts and had three hit singles, including"Young Love" and "Give Your Love to Me." The
self-titled album sold about 250,000 copies, as
did her follow-up, Dream Street.
Born Cherilyn Sarkisian on May 20, 1946 in El
Centro, California. Cher started as a session singer in 1963, and
sang backup on several of Spector’s classic
recordings, including The Righteous Brothers'"You've Lost That Loving Feeling", Darlene
Love's "A Fine, Fine Boy," The Crystals' "Da
Doo Ron Ron" and The Ronettes’ "Be My
Baby". In the composition by Darlene Love, the
listener can clearly hear Cher and Sonny close
to the microphone (along with Love, who
recorded her own backing vocals).
Before being known as Sonny and Cher, the
duo released an album under the name of"Caesar and Cleo." The first "Sonny and Cher"
album, Look At Us, was released in the summer
of 1965. This album contained the overnight
smash single "I Got You Babe" which reached
#1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in August 1965.
In her early career Cher was a fashion trend-
setter, popularizing long straight hair, bell-
bottoms and an exposed midriff. She is noted
as being the first woman to expose her
bellybutton on television. Through her 1970s
television shows she became a sex symbol
and pushed the censors with her revealing
outfits and creative ensembles, frequently
designed by Bob Mackie. In 1989 she boarded
the U.S. Navy's USS Missouri ship in thong and
fishnets for the "If I Could Turn Back Time"
music video, becoming one of the first videos
by a mainstream pop artist to be banned by
MTV (after the video was banned, it grew to
mass popularity, causing MTV to play the
video, though after 9 p.m.)
Cher has been involved with many
humanitarian groups and charity efforts over
the years. After appearing in the movie Mask,
she served as National Chairperson and
Honorary Spokesperson of the Children’s
Craniofacial Association. Over the years while touring, she frequently donated concert tickets
to families and non-profit groups for children
and youth with facial deformities. In 1998, she
co-hosted the annual Amfar AIDS Benefit at the
Cannes Film Festival with Elizabeth Taylor. She
is also the namesake of the Cher Charitable
Foundation, which donates funds to various
charities and causes close to her heart. In
1993, Cher participated in a humanitarian effort
to Armenia (her father was the child of
Armenian refugees), bringing much needed
food and medical supplies
Cher has a very large and devoted fan base.
Their devotion is evidenced through the
biennial Cher Convention that began in
Chicago in 2000 when her song "Believe"
reached number one. The event was held in
Las Vegas in 2002 and 2004, Los Angeles in
2006, and in 2008 at Caesars Palace in Las
Vegas. The Las Vegas convention coincided
with the beginning of Cher's second run at
Caesars Coliseum.
Born Raymond William Stacey Burr May 21,
1917 in New Westminster, British Columbia,
Canada was a Canadian actor, primarily known
for his title roles in the television dramas Perry
Mason and Ironside. His early acting career included roles on
Broadway, radio, television and in film,usually
as the villain. He won two Emmy Awards in
1959 and 1961 for the role of Perry Mason,
which he played for nine seasons between
1957 and 1966. His second hit series, Ironside,
earned him six Emmy nominations, and two Golden Globe nominations. He is also widely
known for his role as Steve Martin in both
Godzilla, King of the Monsters! and Godzilla
1985. In addition to acting, Burr owned an orchid
business and had begun to grow a vineyard.
He was a collector of wines and art, and was
very fond of cooking.
After his death from cancer in 1993, Burr's
personal life came into question as details of
his known biography appeared to be
unverifiable. In 1996, Raymond Burr was ranked #44 on TV
Guide's 50 Greatest TV Stars of All Time.
Maxwell Rivera was born May 23, 1973, in
Brooklyn, NY; he adopted his middle name as
his stage moniker, keeping his real identity a
closely guarded secret out of concern for his
family's privacy. Born of Puerto Rican and
black Caribbean , Maxwell suffered the loss of
his father (in a plane crash) when he was just
three years old. The experience made him a
deeply religious child, and he first began
singing in his Baptist church. He didn't really
get serious about music until age 17, when he
began writing his own songs using a cheap
Casio keyboard given to him by a friend.
Initially influenced by early-'80s urban R&B, he
progressed rapidly, and by 1991 he was
performing on the New York club scene,
despite ridicule from classmates who couldn't
imagine the shy, awkward teenager doing
anything of the sort. After making a name for
himself, he signed a recording contract with
Columbia in 1994.
Maxwell recorded his debut album that year,
working extensively with several collaborators: songwriter Leon Ware (who'd
co-written much of the material on Marvin
Gaye's I Want You album in 1976). Maxwell's
Urban Hang Suite was a romantic concept
album in the vein of Gaye's greatest '70s work,
with a more modern flavor courtesy of Prince's
influence. The record's giddy celebration of
committed monogamy could have come off as
old-fashioned as its classic influences, given
the marketplace dominance of hip-hop soul at
the time. Partly for those fears, it wasn't
released right away. It wasn't until the spring of
1996 that Maxwell's Urban Hang Suite finally
appeared. Sales were slow to take off at first,
even though Maxwell scored some airplay with"...Til the Cops Come Knockin'." The gold-
selling second single "Ascension (Never
Wonder)" lit the fuse, however, and Urban Hang
Suite went platinum before a year had passed,
also earning a Grammy nomination.
Born Patricia Louise Holte on May 24, 1944, in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
A shy girl, Patricia gained confidence through
her singing, which she did every Sunday in the
choir of Beulah Baptist Church in southwest
Philadelphia. As a teenager, she began singing
secular music with friend, Cindy Birdsong. The
duo formed the Ordettes in 1959 and, a year
later, signed on two more friends, Nona
Hendryx and Sarah Dash. As the group
experienced increasing success, Patricia's
parents allowed her to leave high school with
her friends in order to go on tour.
The Ordettes, with Patricia as the lead vocalist,
signed with Newtown Records in 1961. The
company changed the group's name to The
Bluebelles, from which Patti took her new
stage name, LaBelle, French for "The
Beautiful." In their first year at Newtown, they
recorded their debut single "I Sold My Heart to
the Junkman." The song became an instant
gold record and a No. 1 hit.
Going out on the road, the Bluebelles earned
national fame at The Apollo Theater in Harlem,
New York, where they became "Apollo
Sweethearts." The group also enjoyed modest
success with remakes of songs such as "You'll
Never Walk Alone" and "Somewhere Over the
Rainbow," and their ballad "Down the Aisle
(The Wedding Song)" became a top 40 hit. Yet
nothing compared to their early success. In
1967, Cindy Birdsong left the group to join
forces with Diana Ross and the Supremes.
Meanwhile, the remaining members of the
Bluebelles tried to pull out of their musical
slump. In 1970, unable to recreate their early success,
the Bluebelles were dropped from their label
and abandoned by their managers. Patti turned
to promoter Vicki Wickham for help with their
antiquated image. Under Wickham's
management, the group changed their name to
the edgier "LaBelle," altered their fashion to
reflect the 70s glam rock era, and pushed the
limits with their lyrics and music. After
releasing several albums on the Warner Bros.
label, their 1974 release Nightbirds finally
caught on with listeners. The first single off the
album, "Lady Marmalade," about a seductress
in New Orleans, became the group's first No. 1
hit in 12 years.
Born Lisa Nicole Lopes on May 27, 1971, in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Lopes quickly became known around the
Atlanta performing scene by her nickname, "Left-Eye," bestowed upon her by singer
Michael Bivins, who was a former member of
New Edition and a member at the time of new
jack swing sensation Bell Biv Devoe. Noticing
that her left eye was a bit larger than her right
one, Bivins told Lopes that he thought the
difference made her beautiful, and the
nickname "Left-Eye" stuck. After less than a
year in Georgia, Lopes joined forces in 1991
with two other Atlanta-area performers, Crystal
Jones and Tionne Watkins, who were looking
for a third member to join their group, 2nd
Nature, as a rap vocalist. The group renamed
itself TLC after signing a management contract
in 1991 with singer Perri "Pebbles" McKissack
Reid and producer Dallas Austin. Watkins and
Lopes decided to oust Jones from the group
and replace her with Atlanta native Rozonda
Thomas. With the new lineup of TLC complete,
Reid and Austin secured the group a recording
deal with LaFace Records, a company founded
and operated by Kenneth "Babyface"
Edmonds and L.A. Reid, the husband of
Pebbles. TLC entered the studio to make its debut
album, released in 1992 under the title
Oooooooh ... On the TLC Tip. Helped along by
the colorful visuals of the group's videos and a
dash of controversy for Lopes's habit of
wearing a condom on the left lens of her
glasses, the album sold four million copies.
The album also spawned three major hit
singles, the platinum-selling "Ain't 2 Proud 2
Beg" and the gold records "What About Your
Friends?" and "Baby Baby Baby."
Gladys Maria Knight (born May 28, 1944),
known as the "Empress of Soul", is an
American singer-songwriter, actress,
businesswoman, humanitarian, and author.
Gladys Knight & the Pips joined the Motown
roster in 1966, and, although regarded as a
second-string act, scored several hit singles,
including "I Heard It Through the Grapevine
The act left Motown for a better deal with
Buddah Records in 1973, and achieved full-
fledged success that year with hits such as the
Grammy-winning "Midnight Train to Georgia"
(#1 on the pop and R&B chart), "I've Got to Use
My Imagination," and "You're the Best Thing
That Ever Happened to Me". In the summer of
1974, Knight and the Pips recorded the
soundtrack to the successful film Claudine
with producer Curtis Mayfield. The act was
particularly successful in Europe, and
especially the United Kingdom. However, a
number of the Buddah Belly hits followed a
number of years after their success in the US.
For example "Midnight Train to Georgia" hit the
UK pop charts Top 5 in the summer of 1976, a
full three years after its success in the U.S.
During this period of greater recognition,
Knight made her motion picture acting debut in
the film Pipe Dreams, a romantic drama set in
Alaska. The film failed at the box-office, but
Knight did receive a Golden Globe Best New
Actress nomination.
Born Stevland Hardaway Judkins (later
Stevland Morris) on May 13, 1950, in Saginaw,
Michigan.
It's almost impossible to single out the defining
moment in a career as rich and varied as
Stevie Wonder's. Starting out as the beloved
and exasperating mascot of "Hitsville U.S.A."
(a.k.a. Motown), Wonder matured with his
generation and towered over the music of the
1970s with a series of barrier-transcending
albums as brilliant and penetrating as anything
in the history of rock or soul. By the time he
spearheaded the successful drive to have
Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday declared a
national holiday, Wonder had surpassed the
status of musical superstar and established
himself, for better and sometimes worse, as a
national icon.
There's simply too much there to boil down to
a defining moment, but there's no question
about the one that made the rest possible. It
was 1963 and the youthful fireball was part of
an all-star Motown revue at the Regal Theater
in the heart of Chicago's South Side. Already a
popular live performer but without a hit record,
the then "Little" Stevie Wonder was bringing
his set to a close with a call-and-response
rave-up modeled loosely on Ray Charles' "What'd I Say." As the MC called for a final
round of applause and Mary Wells' back-up
band took the stage, Stevie was preparing to
embark on the path to the soul pantheon.
For the rest of the decade, Stevie moved
effortlessly between blazing funk, meditative
social commentary, and heart-wrenching
ballads with a string of hits topped by "Blowin'
in the Wind" (1966); "I Was Made to Love Her"
and "I'm Wondering" (1967); "Shoo-Be-Doo-
Be-Doo-Da-Day" and "For Once in My Life"
(1968); "My Cherie Amour" (1969); and "Signed
Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours" and "Heaven Help
Us All" (1970). While Stevie was clearly established as a major
star, no one, especially Berry Gordy, was
prepared for what happened next. Taking
advantage of the fact that he had the legal right
to disavow contracts signed for him while he
was a minor, Wonder stunned Motown by
declaring himself a free agent immediately after
his 21st birthday. Taking his time to think
things through and hiring ace agent Johanen
Vigoda to negotiate his deal, Wonder
eventually re-signed with Gordy. The new
contract gave him a degree of financial and
creative independence rivaled only by Ray
Charles' deal with ABC.
LaDonna Adrian Gaines (December 31, 1948 – May 17, 2012, known by the stage name Donna Summer, was an American singer/songwriter who gained prominence during the disco era of the 1970s. She had a mezzo-soprano vocal range, and was a five-time Grammy Award winner. Summer was the first artist to have three consecutive double albums reach number one on the US Billboard chart, and she also charted four number-one singles in the United States within a 13-month period.
All hail the queen! Donna Summer has broken the curse. For far too long, record companies have lazily saddled established artists -- black female singers, in particular -- with "covers" projects. Diana Ross, Natalie Cole, Dionne Warwick, Patti Austin, Deniece Williams, Gladys Knight, Miki Howard, Patti LaBelle, and Vanessa Williams have all released albums comprised of well-known songs already emblazoned in the minds of listeners by other artists (or their younger selves, in the case of Warwick). While some efforts certainly succeed more than others, the trend bespeaks a lack of creativity from record labels. These artists are more than worthy of original material. When Donna Summer was approached by Burgundy Records to record an album, she declined the inevitable "standards"-type project they suggested. Instead, Summer played a song for executives that she co-wrote with Lester Mendez and Wayne Hector, the haunting "Be Myself Again." Based on that one song, Burgundy decided that an entire album of Summer's compositions would be a more interesting and creative enterprise than yet another "American Songbook" album.
Washington's own brand of funk that he helped create more than a quarter century ago. One of the most important musicians to ever call Washington D.C. home, Brown was born in the town of Garysburg, North Carolina. His family moved to Washington D.C. when he was three, but as a boy he returned frequently to North Carolina. Brown started playing guitar, inspired by the gospel music of his youth, and by jazz guitarist Charlie Christian. In the early '60s he joined the group Jerry Butler and His Earls of Rhythm. In 1965 he joined Los Latinos, a popular dance band that was helping spread the mambo craze around the mid-Atlantic. Brown's notions of rhythmic complexity took shape while playing in this band, particular his desire to bring congas and cowbells into R&B. In the early '70s he formed his own band, the Soul Searchers, a powerful group dominated by his funky and jazzy guitar playing, and which quickly became one of the most popular on the black music circuit in town – the "go-go clubs"-venues that included the Maverick Room, the Ebony Inn, Club LeBaron, the Burgundy Room, the Masonic Temple and many more. It was competition with other bands (particularly the Young Senators, but also the El Chorals, Scacy & the Sound Service, and interestingly, an all-white group, Tommy Vann & the Professionals) that led to the development of the never-ending set of music. Bands would play their versions of Top-40 hits, and in order to keep people on the dance floor (and not leave to hear a rival group) they would segue into the next song with barely a shift of gears. It was usually up to the drummer to create the smooth transition, while the rest of the band followed. Brown turned this seemingly simple element into an art form, frequently breaking the rhythm in half (if the song was a fast one) and letting the percussionists vamp for several minutes while he decided which song to play next. Brown would also use this musical "breakdown" to communicate directly with his audience. He would call out names of friends "in the house," he would start call-and-response cheers, and while the drummers kept the beat going, he would exhort the crowd to never stop moving.
A British singer and songwriter. He is best known as a member of the Bee Gees, co-founded with his twin brother Maurice and older brother Barry. He had another younger brother, Andy Gibb, who was also a very popular singer.
Born in the Isle of Man to English parents, the family later moved to Manchester before settling in Brisbane, Australia. Gibb began his career as part of the family trio and when the group found their first success they returned to the United Kingdom where they achieved worldwide fame. In 2004, the Bee Gees received their CBEs from the Prince of Wales at Buckingham Palace for their "contribution to music". With record sales estimated in excess of 200 million units, the Bee Gees became one of the most successful pop groups of all time. Traditionally, Robin Gibb's role in the Bee Gees was lead singer, for which he vied with Barry during the group's first period of British success in the late 1960s. This rivalry eventually prompted Robin to leave the group and begin a solo career. The final irritant was when Robin's song "Lamplight" was relegated to the B-side of Barry's song "First of May". Meanwhile, there were rumours during this period that Robin was dealing with drug abuse problems, leading Robin's parents to allegedly threaten legal action to make him a ward of court (the UK age of majority at that time being 21, and he was only 19).
In his solo career, Gibb was initially successful with a number 2 UK hit, "Saved by the Bell" (which sold over one million copies, and received a gold disc). However, Gibb's first solo album, Robin's Reign, was less successful and he soon found that being a solo artist was unsatisfying. Maurice played bass guitar on the song "Mother and Jack", but was subsequently removed from the project by producer Robert Stigwood. Despite having almost completed a second solo album, Sing Slowly Sisters, Gibb reunited with his brothers, who then revived the Bee Gees.
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Patti LaBelle
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