Marvin Gaye

Marvin Gaye was born was born the first son and second eldest of four children to Rev. Marvin Pentz Gay Sr and Alberta Cooper. His sisters, Jeanne and Zeola, younger brother Frankie and Marvin lived in the segregated section of Washington DC's Deanwood neighbourhood in the northeastern section of the city. As a teen, he caddied at Columbia Country Club just outside of DC in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Gaye's father preached in a Seventh-Day Adventist Church sect called the House of God, which went by a strict code of conduct and mixed teachings of Orthodox Judaism and Pentecostalism.

After dropping out of Cardozo High School, Gaye joined the United States Air Force, but he was discharged because he refused to follow orders.

Shortly after starting his recording career at Motown Records, he changed his name from Marvin Gay to Marvin Gaye, adding the 'e' to separate himself from his father and in admiration of his idol, Sam Cooke, who also added an 'e' to his last name.

Marvin Gaye began his career in several doo-wop groups, settling on the Marquees, a popular DC group. With Bo Diddley, the Marquees released a single, 'Wyatt Earp' in 1958 on Okeh Records and were then recruited by Harvey Fuqua to become the Moonglows. 'Mama Loocie', released in 1959 on Chess Records, was Marvin's first single with the Moonglows and his first recorded lead. After a concert in Detroit, the 'new' Moonglows disbanded and Fuqua introduced Gaye to Motown Records president Berry Gordy. He signed Marvin first as a session drummer for acts such as the Miracles, the Contours, Martha & the Vandellas, the Marvelettes and others. Most notably, he was the drummer on the Marvelettes' 1961 number-one hit 'Please Mr Postman' and Little Stevie Wonder's 1963 number-one hit 'Fingertips Pt 2'. He also co-wrote Martha & the Vandellas' 1964 hit 'Dancing in the Street' and the Marvelettes' 1962 hit 'Beechwood 4-5789'. After much pleading, Marvin was signed as a singer less than a year later. Popular and well-liked around Motown, Marvin already carried himself in a sophisticated, gentlemanly manner and had little need of training from Motown's in-house Artist Development director, Maxine Powell.

Marvin issued his first solo recording, The Soulful Moods of Marvin Gaye, in June of 1961, which was the first album issued by the Motown record label besides the Miracles' Hi, We're the Miracles album. An album of Broadway standards and jazz-rendered show tunes, the record failed to chart and Motown issued three singles by Marvin that also failed to chart. After arguing over direction of his career with Gordy, Marvin eventually agreed to conform to record the more R&B-rooted sounds of his label mates and contemporaries, issuing the single, 'Stubborn Kind of Fellow' in July of 1962. The record, co-written by Marvin and produced by friend William ‘Mickey’ Stevenson and which was an autobiographical jab at Marvin's moody behaviour, became a Top Ten hit on the Hot Soul Singles chart and started Marvin Gaye's rise. The single would be followed by his first Top 40 singles, 'Hitch Hike', 'Pride and Joy' and 'Can I Get a Witness', all of which were charted successes for Marvin in 1963. The success continued with the 1964 singles; 'You Are a Wonderful One' which featured background work by the Supremes, 'Try it Baby' which featured backgrounds from the Temptations, 'Baby Don't You Do It' and 'How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved by You)' - which became a signature song of his. His work with Smokey Robinson on the 1966 album, Moods of Marvin Gaye, spawned two consecutive Top Ten singles; 'I'll Be Doggone' and 'Ain't That Peculiar' - which became another signature song of his.

A number of Marvin's hit singles for Motown were duets with female artists such as Mary Wells, Kim Weston and Tammi Terrell; the first Gaye/Wells album, 1964's Together, was Gaye's first charting album. Terrell and Gaye in particular had a good rapport and their first album together, 1967's United, birthed the massive hits 'Ain't No Mountain High Enough' (later covered by Diana Ross and later by former Doobie Brothers singer, Michael McDonald) and 'Your Precious Love'. Real life couple Nickolas Ashford and Valerie Simpson provided the writing and production for the Gaye/Terrell records.

On October 14, 1967, Tammi collapsed into Marvin's arms onstage. She was later diagnosed with a brain tumour and her health continued to deteriorate. Motown decided to try and carry on with the Gaye/Terrell recordings, issuing the You're All I Need album in 1968, which featured the hits 'Ain't Nothing Like the Real Thing' and 'You're All I Need to Get By'. By the time of the final Gaye/Terrell album, Easy in 1969, two tracks were archived Tammi Terrell solo songs with Marvin Gaye's vocals overdubbed onto them.

Tammi's illness put Marvin in a depression; when his Norman Whitfield-produced 'I Heard It Through the Grapevine' became his first number one hit and the biggest selling single in Motown history to that point with four million copies sold, he refused to acknowledge his success, feeling that it was undeserved. His work with Norman Whitfield would result in similar success with the singles 'Too Busy Thinking About My Baby' and 'That's the Way Love Is'.

Tammi Terrell died of a brain tumour on March 16, 1970. Devastated by her death, Marvin subsequently went into seclusion and did not perform in concert for nearly two years. He tried various spirit-lifting diversions, including a short-lived attempt at a football career with the Detroit Lions. He trained hard, but the team's managers turned him down without a tryout. He continued to feel pain, with no form of self-expression. As a result, he entered the studio on June 1, 1970 and recorded the songs 'What's Going On', 'God is Love' and 'Sad Tomorrows' - an early version of 'Flying High (In the Friendly Sky)'.

Marvin wanted to release 'What's Going On', but Motown head Berry Gordy refused, calling the single ‘uncommercial’. Marvin refused to record any more until Berry gave in, and the song became a surprise hit in January 1971. Berry Gordy subsequently requested an entire album of similar tracks from Marvin. The What's Going On album became one of the highlights of Marvin's career and is today his best-known work. Both in terms of sound (influenced by funk and jazz) and lyrical content (heavily political) it was a major departure from his earlier Motown work. Two more of its singles, 'Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)' and 'Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)', became Top Ten pop hits and number-one R&B hits. The album became one of the most memorable soul albums of all time and, based upon its themes, the concept album became the next new frontier for soul music.

After the success of the soundtrack to the blaxploitation film, Trouble Man in 1972, Marvin decided to switch topics from social to sensual with the release of 'Let's Get It On'. The album was a rare departure for the singer for its blatant sensualism inspired by the success of What's Going On and Marvin's need to produce himself in his own way. Yielded by the smash title track and subsequent other hits such as 'Come Get to This', 'You Sure Love to Ball' and 'Distant Lover', Let's Get It On became Marvin Gaye's biggest selling album during his lifetime, surpassing What's Going On. Also, with the title track, Marvin broke his own record at Motown by surpassing the sales of 'I Heard It Through the Grapevine'. The album would be later hailed as 'a record unparalleled in its sheer sensuality and carnal energy'.

Marvin Gaye began working on his final duet album, this time for Diana Ross for the Diana & Marvin project, an album of duets that began recording in 1972, while Diana Ross was pregnant with her second child. Marvin Gaye refused to sing if he couldn't smoke in the studio, so the duet album was recorded by overdubbing Ross and Gaye at separate studio session dates. Released in the fall of 1973, the album yielded the US Top 20 hit singles, 'You're a Special Part of Me' and 'My Mistake (Was to Love You)' as well as the UK versions of two Stylistics' songs, 'You Are Everything' at number five and 'Stop, Look, Listen (to Your Heart)' at number 25, respectively.

In 1976 Marvin released the I Want You LP, which yielded the number-one R&B single, 'I Want You' and the modest charter, 'After the Dance'; and produced erotic album tracks such as 'Since I Had You' and 'Soon I'll Be Loving You Again' with its musical productions gearing Marvin towards more funky material.

In 1977, Marvin Gaye released the seminal funk single, 'Got to Give It Up', which went to number one on both the pop, R&B and dance singles charts and helped his Live at the London Palladium album sell over two million copies and becoming one of the top ten best-selling albums of the year. 1978's Here, My Dear tanked on the charts (despite its later critical re-evaluation) and Gaye struggled to sell a record. By 1979, besieged by tax problems and drug addictions, Gaye filed for bankruptcy and moved to Hawaii where he lived in a bread van.

In 1980, he signed with British promoter Jeffrey Kruger to do concerts overseas with the promised highlight of a Royal Command Performance at London's Drury Lane in front of Princess Margaret. Gaye failed to make the stage on time and by the time he came, everyone had left. While in London, Marvin worked on In Our Lifetime? - a complex and deeply personal record. When Motown issued the album in 1981, Marvin was livid: he accused Motown of editing and remixing the album without his consent, releasing an unfinished song ('Far Cry'), altering the album art he requested and removing the question mark from the title (rendering the intended irony imperceptible).

After being offered a chance to clear things out in Oostende Belgium, he permanently moved there in 1981. Still upset over Motown's hasty decision to release In Our Lifetime, he negotiated a release from the label and signed with Columbia Records in 1982, releasing Midnight Love that year. The album included Marvin's final big hit, 'Sexual Healing'. The song gave him his first two Grammy Awards (best R&B male vocal performance and best R&B instrumental) in February 1983.

The following year, he won a Grammy nomination for best male R&B vocal performance again, this time for the Midnight Love album itself. In February 1983, Marvin Gaye gave an emotional performance of 'The Star-Spangled Banner' at the NBA All-Star Game, held at the Forum in Inglewood, California, accompanied by a drum machine. In March 1983, he gave his final performance in front of his old mentor and label for Motown 25, performing 'What's Going On'. He then embarked on a US tour to support his album. The tour, ending in August 1983, was plagued by health problems and depression.

On April 1st 1984, one day before his forty-fifth birthday, Gaye's father shot and killed him after a family argument. Marvin Sr later was sentenced to six years of probation after pleading guilty to manslaughter. Charges of first-degree murder were dropped after doctors discovered Marvin Sr had a brain tumour. Later serving his final years in a retirement home, he died of pneumonia in 1998.

After some posthumous releases cemented his memory in the popular consciousness, Marvin Gaye was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987. He was later inducted to Hollywood's Rock Walk in 1989 and was given a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1990.

Marvin Gaye married twice and had an adopted son, Marvin Pentz Gaye III (b. 1965). He had a daughter, Nona Marvisa Gaye (b. 1974) and another son, Frankie Christian Gaye (b. 1975).