That’s why the “strangeness” in initially seeing a white musician signed to Motown and belting out the heartiest of soul chords dissolved quickly. Very quickly. Teena Marie said to the world that her lifelong marriage to rhythm and blues is as natural to her as breathing and blinking. And it came across with her music, especially her hit duets with label mate, lover and mentor Rick James on “Fire and Desire” and “I’m a Sucker for Your Love.”
Music in general needed the Teena Maries of the world. Despite the Bee Gees’ prominence in disco and iconic Hall & Oates as one the one of the pioneers of “blue-eye soul,“ respectively, American music was still a mostly segregated society in the late ’70s and early ’80s.
There always has to be someone who shakes the tree — which Marie did in 1980 joints like “Square Biz” and “Must Be Magic” — so that others can get the fruit. Marie’s mastery in the studio and onstage provided fertile ground for a string of blue-eyed females who emerged in the ’80s and ’90s. And she was talented enough to enjoy the fruits of her labor, as the Venice Beach, Calif., native did with “Lovergirl.”
Old-school fans of Marie’s “Ooo La La La” also remember Taylor Dayne‘s jolting and throaty entry into pop fame with the “Tell it To My Heart” smash hit and her brief flirtation with BET. And Gen Xers who loved Marie’s “Here’s Looking at You” will always remember where they were when British beauty Lisa Stansfield‘s “Been Around the World” crashed into their lives with all the force of a meteor ripping through through the Earth’s atmosphere. Christina Aguilera’s golden voice is so powerful and infectious that it would have been recognized in any era. But coming behind Marie made her road to “Lady Marmalade” — where she outsung all the black artists — that much smoother. Joss Stone, JoJo and Mariah Carey also benefited from Marie’s brilliance.
This is what folks loved about Marie most. She expressed her love of funk and R&B without shame and without feeling a need to explain her actions to anyone.
“It’s sad that she’s gone,” says old-school music lover Royce Lewis of Delaware. “I love people who live their lives like they want, and she did that.”
Marie was a very proud and multifaceted artist who was also a self-contained music machine in the tradition of Prince and Rick James. Marie was a keyboardist, percussionist and a guitarist who could write, arrange, produce, sing and perform her music, and pretty much take it from beginning to end on her own. This is a stark contrast to today’s disposable, pop-oven-fresh singers whom record execs plop in to put the finishing touches on a song manufactured by writers, producers and team of industry professionals.
Not only was Teena Marie’s love of R&B real, so was her musicianship. –terry shropshire
