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Down To Earth (Stevie Wonder Album)
''Down to Earth'' is the sixth studio album by American singer-songwriter Stevie Wonder, released on November 16, 1966 on the Tamla (Motown) label. The album was a departure from Wonder's earlier, teen pop-driven albums, and, along with its predecessor, ''Up-Tight'', it re-established the sixteen-year-old Wonder, whose voice had recently changed, as a Motown hitmaker. The album features the hit single " A Place in the Sun". Another single, " Hey Love", became a hit for Detroit soul singer Bettye LaVette the following year. Track listing Side One #" A Place in the Sun" ( Ron Miller, Bryan Wells) - 2:52 #"Bang Bang" (Sonny Bono) - 2:42 #"Down to Earth" (Miller, Avery Vanderberg) - 2:50 #"Thank You Love" (Henry Cosby, Sylvia Moy, Stevie Wonder) - 2:55 #"Be Cool, Be Calm (And Keep Yourself Together)" (Cosby, Moy, Wonder) - 2:43 #"Sylvia" (Cosby, Moy, Wonder) - 2:34 Side Two #"My World Is Empty Without You" ( Holland-Dozier-Holland) - 2:53 #"The Lonesome Road" (Gene Austin, Nat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stevie Wonder
Stevland Hardaway Morris ( Judkins; May 13, 1950), known professionally as Stevie Wonder, is an American singer-songwriter, who is credited as a pioneer and influence by musicians across a range of genres that include rhythm and blues, Pop music, pop, Soul music, soul, Gospel music, gospel, funk, and jazz. A virtual one-man band, Wonder's use of synthesizers and other electronic musical instruments during the 1970s reshaped the conventions of Contemporary R&B, R&B. He also helped drive such genres into the album era, crafting his LP record, LPs as cohesive and consistent, in addition to socially conscious statements with complex compositions. Visual impairment, Blind since shortly after his birth, Wonder was a child prodigy who signed with Motown's Tamla label at the age of 11, where he was given the professional name Little Stevie Wonder. Wonder's single "Fingertips" was a No. 1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100, ''Billboard'' Hot 100 in 1963, at the age of 13, making him the List o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)
"Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)" is the second single by American singer-actress Cher from her second album, ''The Sonny Side of Chér''. It was written by her husband Sonny Bono and released in 1966. The song reached No. 3 in the UK Singles Chart and No. 2 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 for a week (behind " (You're My) Soul and Inspiration" by The Righteous Brothers), eventually becoming one of Cher's biggest-selling singles of the 1960s. History The single proved successful, charting high in several countries. It became Cher's first million-selling single and her first top 3 hit in the UK (and her last until "The Shoop Shoop Song (It's in His Kiss)" reached No. 1 in 1991). Critic Tim Sendra, in his album review of ''The Sonny Side of Cher'', gave the song a mixed review: "The only track that has any real zest is the Bono-written novelty 'Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)', the kind of dramatic song Cher could knock out in her sleep but also a song with no real heart." The revie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Andantes
The Andantes were an American female session group for the Motown record label during the 1960s. Composed of Jackie Hicks, Marlene Barrow, and Louvain Demps, the group sang background vocals on numerous Motown recordings, including songs by Martha Reeves & the Vandellas, the Temptations, Stevie Wonder, the Four Tops, Jimmy Ruffin, Edwin Starr, the Supremes, the Marvelettes, Marvin Gaye and the Isley Brothers, among others. It is estimated they appeared on 20,000 recordings. The Andantes provided back-up singing on Motown singles starting in 1962. The group was most prominently used on all of the Four Tops' Holland–Dozier–Holland-produced hits, including "Baby I Need Your Loving", "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch)", "Reach Out I'll Be There", and more. Motown began to use the Andantes as background vocal substitutes for the vast majority of recordings for its girl groups beginning with the Marvelettes recordings in 1965, Martha & the Vandellas in 1966, and major p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Originals (band)
The Originals, often called "Motown's best-kept secret", were a successful Motown R&B and soul group during the late 1960s and the 1970s, most notable for the hits " Baby I'm for Real", " The Bells", and the disco classic " Down to Love Town." Formed in 1966, the group originally consisted of baritone singer Freddie Gorman, tenor/ falsetto Walter Gaines, and tenors C. P. Spencer and Hank Dixon (and briefly Joe Stubbs). Ty Hunter replaced Spencer when he left to go solo in the early 1970s. They had all previously sung in other Detroit groups, Spencer having been an original member of the (Detroit) Spinners and Hunter having sung with the Supremes member Scherrie Payne in the group Glass House. Spencer, Gaines, Hunter, and Dixon (at one time or another) were also members of the Voice Masters. As a member of the Holland–Dozier–Gorman writing-production team (before Holland–Dozier–Holland), Gorman (as a mailman) was one of the co-writers of Motown's first number 1 pop hit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Morris Broadnax
Morris Ervin Broadnax (February 9, 1931 – February 17, 2009), sometimes credited as Luvel Broadnax (the name of his first wife), was an American songwriter for Motown in the 1960s, most notably working with Stevie Wonder with whom, along with Clarence Paul, he co-wrote Aretha Franklin's hit "Until You Come Back to Me (That's What I'm Gonna Do)". Life and career He was born in Detroit, Michigan, and after graduating high school joined the US Air Force. He later worked on the Ford assembly line in Detroit, and his friend Abdul "Duke" Fakir of the Four Tops encouraged his singing career. He auditioned for Mickey Stevenson at Motown and, though the company did not offer him a recording contract, Stevenson liked one of the songs he had written and performed, and signed him to a songwriting contract in 1961. Retrieved 21 July 2016 At Motown ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Merle Travis
Merle Robert Travis (November 29, 1917 – October 20, 1983) was an American country and western singer, songwriter, and guitarist born in Rosewood, Kentucky, United States. His songs' lyrics often discussed both the lives and the economic exploitation of American coal miners. Among his many well-known songs and recordings are "Sixteen Tons", "Re-Enlistment Blues", " I am a Pilgrim" and " Dark as a Dungeon". However, it is his unique guitar style, still called "Travis picking" by guitarists, as well as his interpretations of the rich musical traditions of his native Muhlenberg County, Kentucky, for which he is best known today. Travis picking is a syncopated style of guitar fingerpicking rooted in ragtime music in which alternating chords and bass notes are plucked by the thumb while melodies are simultaneously plucked by the index finger. He was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970 and elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1977. Biography Early ye ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sixteen Tons
"Sixteen Tons" is a song written by Merle Travis about a coal miner, based on life in the mines of Muhlenberg County, Kentucky. Travis first recorded the song at the Radio Recorders Studio B in Hollywood, California, on August 8, 1946. Cliffie Stone played bass on the recording. It was first released in July 1947 by Capitol on Travis's album ''Folk Songs of the Hills''. The song became a gold record. The line "You load sixteen tons and what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt" came from a letter written by Travis's brother John. Another line came from their father, a coal miner, who would say: "I can't afford to die. I owe my soul to the company store." Tennessee Ernie Ford version The best known version was recorded in 1955 by American singer Tennessee Ernie Ford reached number one in the ''Billboard'' charts, while another version, by Frankie Laine in 1956, was released only in Western Europe, where it gave Ford's version competition. On March 25, 2015, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan, born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Often regarded as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture during a career spanning more than 60 years. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s, when songs such as "Blowin' in the Wind" (1963) and " The Times They Are a-Changin' (1964) became anthems for the civil rights and antiwar movements. His lyrics during this period incorporated a range of political, social, philosophical, and literary influences, defying pop music conventions and appealing to the burgeoning counterculture. Following his self-titled debut album in 1962, which comprised mainly traditional folk songs, Dylan made his breakthrough as a songwriter with the release of ''The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan'' the following year. The album features "Blowin' in the Wind" and the thematically complex " A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall". Many of his s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nat Shilkret
Nathaniel Shilkret (December 25, 1889 – February 18, 1982) was an American musician, composer, conductor and musical director. Early career Shilkret (originally named Natan Schüldkraut) was born in New York City, United States, to parents who emigrated from Lemberg (now Lviv in Ukraine).Shilkret, Nathaniel, ed. Shell, Niel and Barbara Shilkret, ''Nathaniel Shilkret: Sixty Years in the Music Business'', Scarecrow Press, Lanham, Maryland, 2005. Shilkret, Nathaniel, Barbara Shilkret, and Niel Shell, ''Feast or Famine: Sixty Years in the Music Business'', archival edition of Shilkret autobiography, 2001 (copies deposited in the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, The City College of New York Archival Library, The New York Philharmonic Archives, The Victor Archives (SONY)). His father played a number of instruments, and made certain that Nat and his three brothers were all accomplished musicians at an early age. Older brother Lew Shilkret was a fine pianist who also ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gene Austin
Lemeul Eugene Lucas (June 24, 1900 – January 24, 1972), better known by his stage name Gene Austin, was an American singer and songwriter, one of the early "crooners". His recording of " My Blue Heaven" sold over 5 million copies and was for a while the largest selling record of all time. His 1920s compositions "When My Sugar Walks Down the Street" and "The Lonesome Road" became pop and jazz standards. Early life Austin was born as Lemeul Eugene Lucas in Gainesville, Texas (north of Dallas), to Nova Lucas (died 1943) and the former Serena Belle Harrell (died 1956). He took the name Gene Austin from his stepfather Jim Austin, a blacksmith. Austin grew up in Minden, Louisiana. In Minden, he learned to play piano and guitar. He ran away from home at 15. He attended a vaudeville act in Houston, Texas, where the audience was allowed to come to the stage and sing. On a dare from his friends, Austin took the stage and sang for the first time since singing as a Southern Baptist choir ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
My World Is Empty Without You
"My World Is Empty Without You" is a 1965 song recorded and released as a single by the Supremes for the Motown label. Overview Written and produced by Motown's main production team of Holland–Dozier–Holland, the song's fast tempo accompanies a somber lyric which delves into the feelings of depression which can set in after a breakup. "My World Is Empty Without You" was one of the few songs written by the team for the Supremes to not reach number 1, peaking at number 5 on the US pop chart for two weeks in February 1966 and at number 10 on the R&B chart; the single failed to chart on the UK Singles Chart. The group performed the song on the CBS hit variety program ''The Ed Sullivan Show'' on Sunday, February 20, 1966. ''Billboard'' described the song as being "right in their pulsating rhythm groove of 'I Hear a Symphony' with even more excitement in the performance." ''Cash Box'' described it as a "throbbing, rhythmic soulful tearjerker about a love-sick girl who spends her ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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