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OPINION | CRITICAL MASS: On Stevie Wonder and the Summer of Soul
by
Philip Martin
|
Today at 2:00 a.m.
Stevie Wonder sings “It’s Your Thing” at the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, as seen in the documentary “Summer of Soul.”
There is a perspective distortion that comes with looking backward.
Stevie Wonder was 19 on July 20, 1969, when he walked onstage at the Harlem Cultural Festival, an event that would be lost to legend and rumor were it not for Ahmir Questlove Thompson s just-released directorial debut Summer of Soul (. or When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised).
He looks so young, whippet-slim and dangerous in a way you don t expect this avatar of joy to have ever looked. I know better, but still expected him to seem at least a decade older. By the summer of 1969, Stevie Wonder d already released 10 albums. Berry Gordy had signed him to Tamla Records, a Motown subsidiary, when he was 11 years old. He d been on the radio, in my ears, nearl
We continue our look back at the music of 50 years ago…..
Motown founder Berry Gordy made a fortune by controlling the artists on his label. He groomed them…he picked out the songs they recorded…he controlled most of what they did. And some of his major artists began to chafe under that kind of control as we entered the 1970’s. That included Stevie Wonder who turned 21 in 1971. That meant the original contract that kept Wonder on a short leash would come to an end. And Wonder would receive all of the royalties that his 60’s work had piled up. Gordy, of course. wanted to re-sign Wonder and Stevie knew it. So, he demanded some freedom to record the last LP under his old contract and got it for 1971’s ‘Where I’m Coming From”.
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Where I m Coming From, an album released in April 1971 that pointed to greatness.
On the cusp of 21, Wonder was taking control of his music and his life. His contract with Motown allowed him to void their decade-long agreement once he reached legal adulthood, giving him access to a burgeoning trust fund filled with previously earned royalties – and a new leveraging tool. If his hit-factory label boss wanted to keep Wonder, he d have to renegotiate. I wasn t growing, Wonder later told
GQ. I just kept repeating the Stevie Wonder sound, and it didn t express how I felt about what was happening in the world.
If called upon, an overwhelming majority of Americans would likely recognize their country’s national anthem.
Not really by choice as the sluggish and stagnant tune of “The Star-Spangled Banner” is programmed into our brains through class assemblies and professional sports games before we even realize what its words represent.
In spite of this, there have been more than a few iconic renditions of this ballad. Whitney Houston unsurprisingly belted a powerful version at Super Bowl XXV in 1991. Luther Vandross, Jennifer Hudson and even Fergie (though she’s more known for messing it up) have tackled the nation’s musical symbol.