Sad News Norman Whitfield RIP

Sad News Norman Whitfield RIP

Norman Whitfield passed on last Tuesday.

Rightly deserving the acclaim of one the most influential writers/producers, he  was responsible for producing and writing some of the most renowned songs through out the 60s and 70s.

He  passed on aged 67 in Los Angles from diabetes complications after surfacing from a coma

Yet another soul legend gone

An  Obituary can be read via the link below from The Independent Website

In between working in a service station and hustling pool, Whitfield played percussion on recordings by Popcorn and The Mohawks and began hanging around Motown's premises. In 1961, he scored a local hit with "I've Gotten Over You", and Gordy started to take him more seriously, offering him $15 a week to work for Motown in 1962. Whitfield was nominally in charge of appraising white labels without knowing who the artist was. He was competing with Holl-and/Dozier/Holland and Robinson when trying to place his songs with the label's artists. "There was a certain tenaciousness inside of me, something that would always drive me to make something very special," he said.....

.......asked which of his compositions he favoured, Whitfield tended to ignore "Grapevine" and plump for "Too Busy Thinking About My Baby", a 1969 hit for Marvin Gaye, or "Ooh Boy", one of Rose Royce's dozen or so hits in the late 1970s. ...

"The people make the songs what they are," he said. "As writers, we only do what we do and then we have to give it to the public. They're the ones who determine if you're a genius or a failure."

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/norman-whitfield-songwriter-and-producer-who-added-a-political-edge-to-motown-934145.html

Thanks to Hitsville Chalky for keeping us informed during recent weeks