Smokey Robinson - Genius Unlimited Still Feeding our Spirit

I'm sharing this in case you have not already seen/heard Smokey Robinson's latest creative expression. It's a true demonstration of what a great creative presence he is, undiminished by age or time.

I received it in an email entitled, "The Eloquence of a Proud Man". The link was preceeded by a statement exclaiming, " I have never heard Smokey express himself like this...whewwwwwww check him out"

It might seem like he's a long way from Oooh Baby Baby, and Going to a Go Go....but just like then, he is still one of our era's greatest poets. Keeping his finger on our collective pulse, he continues to express the intelligence and sentiments of our Heart's thought perfectly.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_KKyw8V-l0


After checking the video, click on this link for more information about Smokey's tremendous impact on American music. We all know Smokey as a founder of the institution, as well as one of the main artists of the Motown Records lineup. Smokey's writing however, extended not only to the music he performed, but he also created hits for all of the artists that we of boomer generations and others possessed with similarly attuned musical ears have come to appreciate as some of the best popular music ever produced in American music.



NPR has an array of interviews done over the years that you can click on, and listen to the progression of the man's consciousness and wisdom. Lots of interesting links from this webpage. Enjoy!

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6644331


And because the graphics aspect of blogging is soooo much fun for me, I'm giving you a few photos I've come across from Smokey's long illustrious career.


Let the images serve as a point of contemplation. After fully taking the image in, let it be the beginning of a walk back in time to where you were in your own Dear Life, at about the time when the photo was actually captured. Let your memory remember when you might have heard the songs Smokey was singing at that time, and what you were doing and thinking about. Most importantly, try to re-collect what you were dreaming of at that time.

What were your passions, interests, goals and desires?


Sitting like this often brings back into our conscious awareness something that we were good at, that we loved, or wanted to learn how to do, ----that Time and Lack of Attention, has allowed to slip away and fall completely out of our thoughts. Sometimes this insight will resurrect a neglected gift, that we can now recover and enjoy growing with. This is possible at any time and at any age. Many people enjoying new fulfillment and late-in-Life success have learned and proven that the re-embracing of something we always loved, can turn into more than a hobby or causual pasttime. It can develop into whatever we are willing to put into it. You might be harboring a new discovery, a great talent, an ecological solution, unique creative genius, that has patiently sat quietly for 20-70 years, waiting for you to remember how alive you feel when you're engaged in it's pursuit.



Allow yourself as much time as you need, and pay attention to what surfaces, because sitting like this can be very comforting, and relaxing in a stress-filled day. It can also be the beginning of deeper healing of old memories, pains, beliefs and attachements that need to be let go. The distance of time from an incident can be just 'what the doctor ordered', in order to finally be healed of something, that's still unnecessarily festering in your subconscious. Relax, just sitting with it, looking at it from all angles, feeling it, and then allowing it to dissolve in the Light of this moments Love and Wisdom.

Just think about What Really Is...you just strolled down a path, where you got in touch with your past to the that you could say, "Wow,...I've seen The Tracks of My Tears". Now you're free to go Cruisin'. Hey, you ain't a Choosy Beggar. You might even want to Shop Around, because you've weathered the Quiet Storm. As you rise from your Happy Landing, now you know which way to go when you reach A Fork in the Road. Looking at this marvelous Creation around you, you declare, You Really Got a Hold on Me, and feeling the Spirit, you start dancing around, like Mickey's Monkey, cause you finally really get it!!! Hey! This thing called Life is a party, and I'm Going to a Go Go!



Okay.....I'll give you a break.

'Xcuse me if me 'n my sisters laugh at my


silly self...



You are right....with a writer as prolific as Smokey, I could have gone on and on for awhile listing his song titles. And if you want to know where I got them, check this website:

http://www.cduniverse.com/productinfo.asp?pid=1050667&cart=696052612

The CD is the 35th Anniversary Collection CD ~Smokey Robinson.

I am Not advertizing the CD, but if you click on the link, they have samples of some 22 of his hits. It looks like a great investment for a Smokey fan, especially since it includes his years of work with the Miracles.







Robin Terry, Motown CEO, Lyric, grandaughter of
Smokey with grandmother Claudette Robinson


Smokey, Claudette and the Miracles (above 2 photos)











Visiting Studio A at the Motown Museum, October 2007




Smokey, 1972













Well Beloveds~

Have you had enough for today? We're leaving you with some sounds and practices to sustain you until next time. Like the man has already said........for me there really isn't anything better than simply Being With You~


Have fun!!!
Kentke

The information below is for reference only. Some of the links seem to be inactive from this site, but clicking on the link in the blog will take you to the page where the same information is presented. It is all from the NPR Link above:

Motown: Not the Same Old Songs
By Ashley Kahn

Robinson also collaborated with The Marvelettes ("The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game").

Hear More Music, Read About Key Motown Songwriters.
Morning Edition, January 4, 2007 -
So take a good look at my face. You'll see my smile looks out of place. If you look closer, it's easy to trace The tracks of my tears... My smile is my makeup I wear since my breakup with you.
— "The Tracks of My Tears," Smokey Robinson and the Miracles
It's been more than 40 years since the songs of Motown first hit the airwaves and made radios come alive. They're now so ingrained in our musical consciousness that we take them for granted.
The lyrics of many of Motown's best-loved love songs are collected in a new book called — what else? — Motown in Love. The book argues that Motown was a step in the evolution of the American popular song, a tradition reaching back to songwriters like Irving Berlin, George Gershwin and Cole Porter.
Berry Gordy — a songwriter and former boxer — founded the Motown family of labels in 1959 with $800. Smokey Robinson was a charter member, writing hit tunes for his own group the Miracles, as well as other Motown artists.
Robinson remembers the day Motown began. "There were five people there: Berry Gordy said that day, 'We are not going to make black music. We are going to make music for everybody. We are going to make music that has great stories and great beats. We are going to write great songs.'"
By 1965, Motown had been nicknamed Hitsville and Gordy had built a music-producing empire that's often compared to the assembly lines of the automobile industry. Herb Jordan, a music producer and editor of Motown in Love, sees it differently.
"It was really this creative enclave, a salon, if you will, where brilliant musicians from many different traditions — from jazz, from gospel — convened, passed on musical knowledge and a love for a lyric and for a great song. The motivation of the book is to really get people to understand that behind these fantastic performances by The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops, there were a group of songwriters who were masters at their craft. The songwriters labored over the lyrics. They labored over the phrasing."
The lyrics of Motown are more than just words to feel-good songs for the Big Chill generation. But can they be considered American standards — like the best Tin Pan Alley tunes?
According to Jordan, that's exactly what Motown songwriters grew up listening to. "Every household in black America had Ella Fitzgerald records, Duke Ellington records, Sarah Vaughn records. They were playing the music of George Gershwin, Jerome Kern. So most people of that era grew up with those songs — they grew up with the great American songbook."
For black America, the 1960s were a decade filled with social protest and raw emotion — especially in cities like Detroit. And yet this urban center produced uplifting songs of love.
"At Motown, 95 percent of the songs were written by young, black men," Jordan says. "They wrote for the male and female artists, and brought to it a sense of vulnerability any English professor would be proud of. Coming out of Detroit, one of harshest environments you could imagine, they elected to write love songs."
"Love is my favorite subject to write about," Robinson says. "You see, love is the only thing that's there that I can think of that will be everlasting, and I want to write everlasting songs."
Forty years after they first rolled off the assembly line, the love songs of Motown sound fresh and still run reliably, with lyrics that balance literary elegance and a hip, street vernacular.
One could say the same thing about the most enduring and loved songs by songwriters like Rodgers & Hammerstein, or Jerome Kern, or Johnny Mercer. By this measure alone, it's clear that Motown has written its own chapter in the Great American Songbook.

Ashley Kahn is the author of the book The House That Trane Built: The Story of Impulse Records.

The 'Silent Architects' of Motown
By Ashley Kahn

NPR.org, January 4, 2007 -
"I call them the silent architects of Motown. Very often the public has no idea who wrote the song." -- Herb Jordan, music producer and editor of the book Motown in Love
In its heyday, Motown was a music-producing empire that is still often compared to the assembly lines of the automobile industry. Herb Jordan sees it a little differently: "It was really this creative enclave, a salon, if you will, where the brilliant musicians from many different traditions -- from jazz, from gospel -- convened and passed on musical knowledge and a love for a lyric and for a great song. Berry Gordy recognized the value of a great song. Songs were chosen in a trial by fire and it was very competitive between songwriters."
Smokey Robinson was a charter member of the Motown "salon," and recalls the competitive spirit, and how it fell into a weekly ritual.
"We not only looked at everybody outside of Motown as our competition, but we looked at each other as competition, you know what I mean? Nobody was not competition in our eyesight. And we had better come with a great song, because when it came to Monday morning meetings, your song was either shot down, or given the thumbs up."
Not surprisingly, as Robinson notes, "the writers and the producers wrote songs that were pinpointed or designated for a said artist -- like 'My Girl' was definitely a Temps song. It was definitely a David Ruffin [of the Temptations] song. Very few of the songwriters wrote a song and then said, 'Let me see who this song would be good for.'"
Robinson was one of a number of great songwriters that defined the Motown legacy: a group that also includes lesser-known individuals like Mickey Stevenson, Ivy Jo Hunter, Marilyn McLeod. Four songwriters or songwriting teams that benefited from the creative pressure-cooker Gordy created in the'60s, and received the thumbs up to have Motown groups record their material, are celebrated below.

Related NPR Stories
Dec. 15, 2006'Dreamgirls' Does Justice to a Cinematic Musical
Dec. 25, 2006'Fresh Air' Interview: Holland, Dozier and Holland
Dec. 25, 2006'Fresh Air' Interview: Smokey Robinson
Jul. 24, 2006Smokey Robinson: A Classic Sings the Classics
Oct. 5, 2005'Motown Remixed': It Works
Jul. 18, 2005Giving Motown Its Due
Jan. 3, 2007Smokey Robinson and the Miracles' First Year
Oct. 12, 2004Motown Legend Lamont Dozier's 'Reflections'
Mar. 5, 2004Commentary: Growing Up in Motown
Nov. 16, 2002Funk Brothers: Motown's Secret Weapon
Sep. 3, 2001Martha Reeves: 'Dancing in the Street'
Jun. 4, 2000NPR 100: 'My Girl'