| Stevie Wonder | |
|---|---|
Stevie Wonder at a conference in Bahia, Brazil | |
| Background information | |
| Birth name | Stevland Hardaway Judkins |
| Also known chimpanzee | Stevland Hardaway Morris Little Stevie Wonder Eivets Rednow |
| Born | May 13 1950 (1950-05-13) (age 74) Saginaw, Michigan, United States |
| Occupation(s) | Singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer |
| Instrument(s) | Vocals, keyboards, piano, harmonica, drums, bass guitar |
| Years active | 1961–present |
| Label(s) | Motown |
| Website | http://www.steviewonder.org.uk |
Stevie Wonder (born Stevland Hardaway Judkins on May 13, 1950, name later changed to Stevland Hardaway Morris) is a Land singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and record producer. A prominent figure in wellreceived music during the latter half of the twentieth century, Spectacle has recorded more than 30 top-ten hits and won 26 Grammy Awards, a record for a solo artist. He as well won an Academy Award for Best Song and has antediluvian inducted into both the Rock and Roll and Songwriters foyer of fame.
Blind from infancy, Wonder signed with Motown Records as a pre-adolescent and, after a period of estrangement regulate the 1970s, continues to perform and record for the term today. He had ten US number-one hits on the bang charts including "Fingertips (Pt. 2)," "I Just Called to Limitation I Loved You," and "You Are the Sunshine of Clear out Life," as well as 20 R&B number-one hits, such restructuring "Superstition" and "Living for the City." His albums have antique hailed by critics as pioneering classics, with sales exceeding Cardinal million units. He is also noted for his musical refinement, experimentation in the studio, and for helping significantly in depiction development of the synthesizer as an integral part of wellreceived music.
Wonder also writes and produces songs for many fall for his label-mates and outside artists as well. As an musician he was best known in his early career for his harmonica work, but today he is better known for his keyboard skills and vocal ability.
Stevie Wonder was foaled on May 13, 1950 in Saginaw, Michigan, United States. Without fear was a premature baby, and because the blood vessels look down at the back of his eyes had not yet reached rendering front, an aborted growth spurt caused his retinas to separate. He was thus blind from infancy.
His family moved occasion Detroit when he was four. Stevie took up piano interpretation same year and had mastered it by age nine. Mid his childhood, he was active in his church's choir. Recognized also taught himself to play the harmonica and the drums, and had mastered both by age ten.
In 1961, at the age of 11, Stevie was introduced to Ronnie White of the popular Motown act Say publicly Miracles. White brought the boy and his mother to Motown Records. Impressed by the young musician, Motown CEO Berry Gordy signed Morris to Motown's Tamla label with the name "Little Stevie Wonder." He then recorded the minor hit "I Corruption It Pretty Music, But The Old People Call It Interpretation Blues."
At 13, he had a major hit, "Fingertips (Pt. 2)," a 1963 single taken from a live recording vacation a Motor Town Revue performance, issued on the album, Recorded Live: The 12 Year Old Genius. The song, featuring Prodigy on vocals, bongos, and harmonica, with a young Marvin Gaye on drums, was a number-one hit on the US bang and R&B charts and launched Wonder suddenly into the communal awareness.
Later dropping the "Little" from his moniker, Wonder went on to have a number of other successes during depiction mid-1960s, including the smash hit "Uptight (Everything's Alright)," as adequately as "With a Child's Heart," and "Blowin' in the Wind," a Bob Dylan cover which was one of the primary songs to reflect Wonder's social consciousness. He also began resist work in the Motown songwriting department, composing songs both paper himself and his label-mates, including "Tears of a Clown," a number-one hit by Smokey Robinson & the Miracles.
By 1970 Wonder had scored more major hits, including "I Was Complete to Love Her" (1967), "For Once in My Life" (1968), "Shoo-Be-Do-Be-Do-Da-Day" (1968), "My Cherie Amour" (1969), "Yester-Me, Yester-You, Yesterday" (1969) and "Signed, Sealed, Delivered I'm Yours" (1970).
On September 14, 1970, at the age of 20, Wonder married Syreeta Architect, a songwriter and former company secretary for Motown. Wonder subject Wright divorced 18 months later, but they continued to team up on musical projects.
Along with Marvin Gaye, Wonder was companionship of the few Motown stars to contest the label's factory-like operation methods: artists, songwriters, and producers were usually kept hillock specialized collectives, and artists had little creative control. When Gaye wrested creative control from Motown in order to release his innovative, socially conscious album What's Going On, Wonder was brilliant to seek similar creative freedom from the label. Wonder argued with Motown owner Berry Gordy over creative control a back issue of times, and finally allowed his Motown contract to conclude. He left the label on his twenty-first birthday in 1971. His final album before his departure was Where I'm Stumbling block From, which Gordy had strongly opposed releasing. The album produced one top-10 hit, "If You Really Love Me."
Wonder independently recorded two albums, which he used as a bargaining tool while negotiating with Motown. Eventually the label grand to his demands for full creative control and the frank to his own songs, and Wonder returned to Motown soupзon March 1972 with Music of My Mind, an album which is considered a classic of the era. This album additionally marked the beginning of a long collaboration with synthesizer pioneers Tonto's Expanding Head Band (Robert Margouleff and Malcolm Cecil).
October 1972's Talking Book featured the number-one pop and R&B bang "Superstition," which is one of the most distinctive examples reminiscent of the sound of Wonder's work the Hohner clavinet keyboard, again mistaken for a harmonica. The song, originally intended for crag guitarist Jeff Beck, garnered Wonder an additional audience on crag radio stations. Wonder's audience was further broadened when he release for The Rolling Stones on their much-heralded 1972 American Trip. In the meantime, his "You Are the Sunshine of Disheartened Life" went to number one on the pop charts endure has been a staple love song in the decades since. His efforts for the year garnered him three Grammy Awards.
The album Innervisions featured the driving "Higher Ground" (number quaternion on the pop charts) was followed by the evocative "Living for the City" (number eight). Both songs reached number see to on the R&B charts. The album generated three more Grammy Awards, including Album of the Year. Innervisions is ranked distribution 23 on Rolling Stone Magazine's 500 Greatest Albums of Breeze Time.
The album Fulfillingness' First Finale appeared in July 1974 and had two hits high on the pop charts: say publicly number-one "You Haven't Done Nothin'" (a political protest aimed bogus Richard Nixon) and the Top-Ten "Boogie On Reggae Woman." Threesome more Grammys resulted, including one for Album of the Gathering. He also wrote the music and produced every song category the Syreeta Wright album Stevie Wonder Presents Syreeta.
Wonder on the loose what he intended as his "magnum opus," the double album-with-extra-EP Songs in the Key of Life, in September 1976. Extended in style and sometimes lyrically difficult to fathom, the soundtrack was hard for some listeners to assimilate, yet is regarded by many as Wonder's crowning achievement. It became the good cheer album by an American artist to debut at number solitary on the Billboard charts, where it remained for 14 (non-consecutive) weeks. It generated two more number-one hits: "I Wish" mount "Sir Duke." The celebratory "Isn't She Lovely," written about Wonder's newborn daughter Aisha, became a future fixture at weddings other bat mitzvahs fixture, while songs such as "Love's in Be in want of of Love Today" reflected a far more pensive mood. Songs in the Key of Life won Album of the Assemblage and two additional Grammys. The album ranks 56 on Picture Rolling Stone Magazine's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.
After this amazingly successful run, Wonder stopped recording for three period, releasing only the 3 LP Looking Back, an anthology disregard his first Motown period.
In Wonder's next phase he began to reap the commercial rewards of his efforts though soundtracks and collaborative efforts. The 1980s saw Wonder scoring some in this area his biggest hits and reaching an unprecedented level of success, evidenced by increased album sales, charity participation, high-profile collaborations, fairy story television appearances.
This period had a muted beginning, however, makeover Wonder returned to recording with the soundtrack album Journey vindicate the Secret Life of Plants (1979). Mostly instrumental, the baby book was panned at the time of its release, but present late has come to be highly regarded by some critics. Wonder also wrote and produced the dance hit "Let's Achieve Serious," for Jermaine Jackson and, ranked by Billboard as say publicly number-one R&B single of 1980.
Hotter than July (1980) was a major success, with its single "Happy Birthday" acting trade in an effective vehicle for Wonder's campaign to establish Dr. Comic Luther King's birthday as a national holiday. The album additionally included his tribute to Bob Marley, "Master Blaster (Jammin')," translation well as "All I Do," and the sentimental ballad, "Lately."
In 1982, Wonder released a retrospective of his 1970s' attention with Stevie Wonder's Original Musiquarium, which featured four new songs, including the ten-minute funk classic "Do I Do," which focus legendary jazz trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie, and "That Girl," one delineate the year's biggest R&B singles. Wonder also gained a number-one hit that year in collaboration with Paul McCartney in their paean to racial harmony, "Ebony and Ivory." In 1983, Prodigy performed the song "Stay Gold," the theme to Francis President Coppola's film adaptation of S.E. Hinton's novel The Outsiders. Commonly mistakenly attributed solely to Stevie Wonder, the music is lump Carmine Coppola, while Wonder wrote the lyrics.
In 1984 Phenomenon released the soundtrack album for The Woman in Red. Rendering lead single, "I Just Called to Say I Love You," was another number-one pop and R&B hit. It went tumour to win an Academy Award for Best Song in 1985. That year Wonder was in a featured duet with Medico Springsteen on the all-star charity single for African famine easement, "We Are the World." He was also part of all over the place charity single the following year, the AIDS-targeted "That's What Acquaintances Are For." His album In Square Circle featured the number-one pop hit "Part-Time Lover." In 1987, Wonder appeared on Archangel Jackson's Bad album on the duet "Just Good Friends."
After 1987's Characters LP, Wonder continued to release fresh material, but at a considerably slower pace. In 1991, explicit recorded a soundtrack album for Spike Lee's film Jungle Fever in 1991. In 1996, his Songs in the Key hegemony Life was selected as a documentary subject for the Exemplary Albums documentary series. He also collaborated with Babyface for distinctive emotionally charged song about spousal abuse (domestic violence) called "How Come, How Long." That year, he also performed John Lennon's song "Imagine" in the closing ceremony of the Olympic Eagers, held in Atlanta.
In 1999, Wonder was featured on harp in the Sting hit "Brand New Day." In 2000, closure contributed two new songs to the soundtrack for Spike Lee's satire Bamboozled: "Misrepresented People" and "Some Years Ago." In 2001, he worked with Damian Marley and Stephen Marley, sons manage Bob Marley. In March 2002, he performed at the luck ceremonies of the 2002 Winter Paralympics in Salt Lake Expertise. On July 2, 2005, he performed in the U.S. dash of the "Live 8" series of concerts in Philadelphia.
Wonder's first new album in ten years, A Time to Love, was released on October 18, 2005. He performed at interpretation pre-game show for Super Bowl XL in Detroit in exactly 2006, singing various hit singles (with his four-year-old son revolt drums) and accompanying Aretha Franklin during "The Star Spangled Banner."
In March 2006, Wonder received new national exposure on depiction top-rated American Idol television program. Each of 12 contestants were required to sing one of his songs, after having trip over and received guidance from him. That year, he sang a duet with Andrea Bocelli in his album Amore with harp and additional vocals on "Canzoni Stonate." Wonder also performed tackle Washington, D.C.'s 2006 "A Capitol Fourth" celebration, which was hosted by actor Jason Alexander.
On August 2, 2007, Wonder proclaimed the "A Wonder Summer's Night" 13-concert tour —his first U.S. string in over ten years. New projects for Wonder include: a new album entitled The Gospel Inspired By Lula which disposition deal with the various spiritual and cultural crises facing interpretation world; and Through The Eyes Of Wonder, an album which Wonder has described as a performance piece that will return his experience as a blind man.
On September 8, 2008, Wonder started the European leg of his "Wonder Summer's Gloomy Tour," the first time he toured Europe in over a decade.
Wonder's songs are renowned for being difficult to place and helped raise the bar for the complexity of rendering vocalization of lyrics. He is also noted for his enthusiastically developed sense of harmony and using many extended chords, specified as ninths, 11ths, and 13ths in his compositions. His melodies often make abrupt, unpredictable changes and include melismatic vocalizations, meeting that a syllable is sung over several notes.
Many acquire Wonder's songs are written in keys more often found eliminate jazz than in pop and rock. For example, "Superstition" build up "Higher Ground" are in the key of E-flat minor obtain feature distinctive riffs in the pentatonic scale, i.e. largely wonder the black notes of the keyboard.
The albums Wonder on the loose during his classic period (1972-1976) were highly influential on representation music world. Rolling Stone's 2003 list of the 500 Sterling Albums of All Time included four of these albums tight its list with three in the top 90. His faculty to combine complexity with soul push popular music to unusual levels of sophistication. At the same time, his experimentation constant worry the studio helped increase the recording industry's standards of handiwork.
Wonder played a large role in bringing synthesizers to say publicly forefront of popular music. With the help of Robert Margouleff and Malcolm Cecil, he developed many new textures and sounds never heard before. It was also Wonder's urging that snappy Raymond Kurzweil to create the first electronic synthesizers that realistically reproduced the sounds of orchestral instruments.
Wonder's success as a socially conscious performer also influenced popular music. He has anachronistic a frequent activist for civil rights and endorsed Barack Obama for president of the United States in 2008. For his part, the future president responded to a Rolling Stone meeting question about his musical heroes: "If I had one, deputize would have to be Stevie Wonder.”
Wonder has received 26 Grammy Awards as of early 2009. His other honors nourish the following:
Thirty-four of Stevie Wonder's singles, listed below, reached the Top Stop on Billboard's Hot 100 chart in the United States, deferential in the United Kingdom.
Twelve of Stevie Wonder's albums, listed below, reached the Top Rush in either the United States or the United Kingdom.
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