Stevland Hardaway Judkins (born May 13, 1950), name later changed to Stevland Hardaway Morris....
Stevie Wonder is 61 today, and we would be remiss if we did't pay tribute to this great man and offer thanks for a lifetime of great stuff that started coming out...well, well before I even came out!!!!!
Stevie Wonder entered the synagogue for a post-concert party Motown was throwing for him. Half a year after the tour with the Stones, he was completing his show of new strength. He had conquered New York a month ago; here, he was headlining two shows, at Winterland and at the Berkeley Community Theater. He sold out both shows and won over both audiences. For the wider, whiter crowds he now draws, Wonder mixes together an Afro consciousness, a jazz/soul/rock/synthesized-up music, medleys of old hits and bits of other people's hits, and, in one quick exercise in excess, a shot of one-man-band razzmatazz, as he moves from drums to electric piano to ARP-wired clavinet to guitar to harmonica. What he cannot achieve through eye contact is reached by output of energy, by a music that is by turns loving and lusty, that tells how Stevie Wonder cherishes freedom, and how he uses it. And the music, sure enough, reflects the man.
By age 13, Wonder had a major hit, "Fingertips (Pt. 2)", a 1963 single taken from a live recording of a Motor Town Revue performance, issued on the album Recorded Live: The 12 Year Old Genius. The song, featuring Wonder on vocals, bongos, and harmonica, and a young Marvin Gaye on drums, was a #1 hit on the U.S. pop and R&B charts and launched him into the public consciousness.
With minimal control over what he was allowed to produce, Wonder still managed to give the world an early glimpse of his humanitarian principles. He released a hit cover of Bob Dylan's "Blowin' in the Wind" and Ron Miller's "A Place in the Sun" in 1966. By this time, Wonder began to demand more control over his career...In 1969 he released a song he actually recorded three year previously, "My Cherie Amour,"
to much success and later the Top Ten "Yesterday Me, Yester-You, Yesterday." For the album Singed, Sealed, & Delivered Wonder received co-production credit for the first time. The single "Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours," was co-written by Wonder and singer Syreeta Wright, whom he married later that year. The marriage between Wonder and Wright lasted only 18 months, but the two continued to collaborate on musical endeavors
Released in late 1972, Talking Book featured the No. 1 hit "Superstition", which is one of the most distinctive and famous examples of the sound of the Hohner clavinet keyboard. The song features a rocking groove that garnered Wonder an additional audience on rock radio stations.
Innervisions, released in 1973, featured "Higher Ground" (#4 on the pop charts) as well as the trenchant "Living for the City" (#8). Both songs reached No. 1 on the R&B charts.
Why did those days ever have to go?
"You Haven't Done Nothin'" is a 1974 funk single by Stevie Wonder featuring background vocals from The Jackson 5, taken from the album Fulfillingness' First Finale. The politically aware song became Wonder's fourth number-one pop hit, his tenth number one soul hit,[1] and was one of his angriest political statements, aimed squarely at former President Richard Nixon. This song also features a thick clavinet track and an early appearance of the drum machine.
Stevie Wonder performed on January 18, 2009 at the We Are One: The Obama Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial. On Inauguration Day, January 20, 2009, Wonder performed the song "Brand New Day" with musician Sting. He performed his new song "All About the Love Again" and, with other musical artists, "Signed, Sealed, and Delivered". On February 23, 2009, Wonder became the second recipient of the Library of Congress's Gershwin Prize for pop music, honored by President Barack Obama at the White House
I could go on...oh yes I could. I left out a LOT here.
Please add your favorites in the thread.
But please do wish a Happy Birthday to Stevie Wonder!
Cuz I do...do I?
Do I do?