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Entertainment behind the scenes
Berry Gordy to pen intro for “Moonwalk” re-issue
(Writing and reporting by Christine Kearney)
As it gears up for a major re-issue of Michael Jackson’s autobiography “Moonwalk,” Harmony Books on Thursday said Motown founder Berry Gordy would write an introduction with his recollections of the singer he helped launch into pop superstardom.
Gordy, who also ushered the likes of Diana Ross, Smokey Robinson and Marvin Gaye into prominence and signed the Jackson 5 to a recording contract in 1968, will share his thoughts on why Michael rose to fame so quickly and his first impressions of the group’s audition, Harmony revealed.
The 79-year-old Gordy said at Jackson’s public memorial in July (pictured at right) that calling Jackson the King of Pop was simply “not good enough.” Instead, Gordy called him “the greatest entertainer that ever lived.”
The book, which was initially edited by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis along with current Harmony vice president and publisher Shaye Areheart, will go on sale Oct. 13 at a price of $25. Areheart will provide an afterword, but in between her and Gordy the story will be all Jackson’s just as originally published in 1988.
The new edition of “Moonwalk” is one of several media projects that have been announced following Jackson’s sudden death due to cardiac arrest on June 25. Columbia Pictures will make a movie with video footage of him rehearsing for a concert only days before his death, and the executors of his state are planning a traveling memorabilia show and have agreed to numerous licensing deals.
Those projects, along with increased interest and sales of Jackson’s old records, are expected to bring hundreds of millions of dollars to his estate. You can read all about it by clicking here and here.
Michael Jackson becomes Motown’s latest fallen hero
What was supposed to be a yearlong celebration of Motown Records’ 50th anniversary, turned into a major tragedy with the death on Thursday of one of its biggest stars, Michael Jackson.
The 50-year-old self-proclaimed “King of Pop” died of suspected cardiac arrest as he was about to launch a major comeback with a string of 50 concerts in London.
It comes 25 years after the death of another Motown alumnus, Marvin Gaye, who was also on the comeback trail. Gaye was shot to death by his father in a domestic dispute.
Jackson rose to fame as the youngest member of the Jackson 5, a group that Motown founder Berry Gordy was initially reluctant to sign. “He didn’t want any more kid acts because Stevie Wonder was more than a handful,” said former Motown executive Suzanne de Passe, who lobbied Gordy to sign them.
De Passe toured extensively with the Jackson 5, taking charge of their costumes, schooling, choreography and concert production. “Michael was very mischievous back in those days,” de Passe said, recalling that he loved to hide in closets and behind doors to scare unsuspecting targets. She dubbed him “Casper,” and when she saw him decades later mobbed by fans, she yelled out “Casper!” and Jackson immediately rushed over to give her a hug.
Jackson left Motown for the greener pastures of Epic Records in 1979, and de Passe said she last spoke to him about three years ago. She was on a retreat when she heard of Jackson’s death, and described the news as “the shock of my life.”
Until Thursday, Gaye was probably Motown’s highest-profile casualty. The tortured soul’s career was marked by drugs, divorce, label disputes and bankruptcy. Drugs, poverty, suicide and murder claimed many other Motown figures. A year before Gaye was killed, virtuoso bass player James Jamerson died in obscurity. A raging alcoholic who played on Gaye’s landmark 1971 album “What’s Going On,” Jamerson has since been deified by aficionados.
P Diddy had very precisely described the genius of Michael Jackson: “He showed that you can actually see the beat. He made the music come to life. He made me believe in magic.”
Check other notable tributes paid to Michael Jackson by peers:
http://www.tributespaid.com/category/m/m ichael-jackson
DvF’s knits and hats hit right note with Diana Ross
Diana Ross, the Motown star who favors sequins and silk for her concert wardrobe, gave her friend, designer Diane von Furstenberg, a rave on Sunday for her fall 2009 collection of cozy knits and funky hats shown during New York Fashion Week.
“I loved the knits, and I absolutely loved the hats,” Ross said in a backstage interview after the runway show on Sunday afternoon in the Tent at Bryant Park in midtown Manhattan.
Knit cocoon coats, flowing sweater jackets and knit dresses over “sweater pants” were topped off by traffic-stopping hats, distinguished by huge piles of pompoms in outre color combinations of brights and dark neutrals (red, pink, orange and black, for instance.) The clothes looked like they would travel well and give women some versatile options for cold weather.
The fall 2009 look marked a distinct departure from last year’s fall/winter collection, when the designer’s inspiration was “film noir” glamor evoked by 1940s menswear blazers and slip dresses.
Velvet popped up on the DvF runway in surprising places, lending comfortable elegance to her iconic wrap dress, which became a best seller in the 1970s and established Diane von Furstenberg as a major name in American fashion design.
“I loved the velvet, too,” said Ross, who shot to fame with the Supremes in the 1960s when Motown hits became part of the soundtrack for the civil rights movement. After that, she launched a solo act that still sells out major concert venues. Ross, with her curly black hair flowing long and wide around her, was swarmed by photographers before the show began when she took her seat on the front row.
After the models paraded single file to signal the end of the show, von Furstenberg walked the runway on the arm of creative director Nathan Jenden. Then she broke into a little dance as music director Michel Gaubert pumped the house full of the voice of Diana Ross singing one of her greatest solo hits, “Upside Down” from 1980: “Upside down, boy, you send me, inside out, ’round and ’round …”
