Marvin Pentz Gaye was one of the most recognized singers in American Music history. He was an exceptional songwriter and singer, with over a three-octave range. His forty-year career was marked by triumph and tragedy, elation and depression. He was the victim of his own genius, however, ending in his tragic murder at the hands of his abusive father in 1984. Marvin Gaye’s early career was no easy path. He was born the son of a Seventh Day Adventist minister in a strict, abusive household. He worked hard and developed a passion for music as a child. His musical prowess was finally recognized serendipitously at a Motown Christmas party sponsored by Barry Gordy. Marvin also developed a relationship with his daughter and future wife, Anna Gordy. He was a janitor and back up drummer while continuing to develop as a solo artist. His religious upbringing and his experience as a back up musician for the likes of The Supremes, The Miracles, The Marvelletes and Little Stevie Wonder. His initial recordings with Motown were unsuccessful and he was afforded time to develop. Then in 1964, early in his career as a singer, he began to experience success with his collaborative works with greats such as Smokey Robinson (“I’ll Be Doggone”) and Holland-Dozier-Holland(“How Sweet it Is”). According to Smokey Robinson, “Because of his flexibility and inherent musicality, Marvin was a producer’s dream. “You give Marvin material,” said Smokey, “and he’d improve, sculpt it, turn it into something bigger and better.” His work was soulful and introspective. According to David Ritz, “ …I saw him as a man of quick wit, rare wit and light-hearted humor. His boyish charm and infectious smile were irresistible. His paradoxes were fascinating. In the middle of conversations, he’d stop to meditate or pray, his words turning into songs. As a collaborator, he was fabulous — right there, in the moment, an ingenious improviser and natural storyteller.”
Marvin Gaye developed into an anti-conformist and anti-authoritarian figure in his work, likely as a result of his strict upbringing. In Gaye’s career, questionably his best singing performances were with Tammi Terrell with hits such as “ I Heard it Through The Grapevine” ( Young readers likely relate this song to Kellogg Raisin Bran commercials!) and “Aint Nothing Like the Real Thing”. Tragedy struck on October 14, 1967 during a Homecoming performance at my Alma Mater, Hampden Sydney College in Farmville, Virginia, where Terrell collapsed on stage at the age of twenty-four from an undiagnosed malignant brain tumor. Her death would lead to times of severe depression for Marvin Gaye that would forever affect his career.
Motown in the sixties was a producer driven industry, and the strong-willed Marvin Gay was a non-conformist and determined to change that. According to Gaye, “I didn’t make it playing by the rules,” he sings. “Only three things that’s for sure — taxes, death, and trouble.” He became troubled after hearing his brother’s accounts of his Vietnam experience – violence, poverty, authoritarianism and loneliness. After seeing police brutality inflicted on San Francisco protestors, he and co-writer Renaldo Benson of The Four Tops wrote “What’s Going On” to the dismay of Barry Gordy and all other industry critics. An interesting musical fact is that session saxophonist and Funk Brother Eli Fontaine was not to play the intro to the song; however, upon hearing him practice and have it recorded in a hallway, Gaye realized he had the legendary “hook” and used it in the song. Also, funk Brother bassist, the legendary James Jamerson (from my hometown of Charleston!) was recruited from a bar where he was too drunk to sit, so he played the bass during the session while laying on the floor! Gaye also had recruited some of his Detroit Lion football teammates to participate in the song. You can hear their talk in the background. A Detroit gem that seemed to be another musical “goat rodeo”. The industry didn’t want a protest song intended for Joan Baez to perform to tarnish the sex symbol image of Gaye. Reportedly the only support he received for “What’s Going On” was from the Young Stevie Wonder – what an endorsement! The single was released (actually leaked to a radio station in Los Angeles) with little fanfare and the staunch objection of Gordy, despite the single selling over 100,000 copies on its first day of release. The song was a classic, for it was part of the eleventh studio album for Gaye, despite the rancorous arguments with Gordy due to the nature of the album’s topics of inner city poverty (“Inner City Blues”), war, pollution (“Mercy Mercy Me”) and drug abuse. Gaye had found himself at last, writing from his soul. Against all odds, he bucked the system, the establishment, and persisted following his heart. This was reflected in his songs. He also changed how other artists were approaching Motown, by rebelling and producing their own concepts, such as Stevie Wonder and “ Where I’m Coming From”.
So, when is enough enough? What makes an artist have the drive and self-determination against all odds to fight for what moves his or her soul? That is what it took for Marvin Gaye. So much love and pleasure mingled with depression and drug abuse, a life finally ending so violently by the hand of an enraged father’s gun in 1984.
Rudolph
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Gaye
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/marvin-gaye/introduction/73/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xz-UvQYAmbg&feature=related
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What's_Going_On
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What's_Going_On_(song)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Jamerson
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