Motown's Enduring Impact on Detroit Youth

Hey It's Consider this from NPR. I'm Scott Detreru here with a bonus episode. As usual, we are bringing you one extra really good story Thanks so much for your ongoing support To mark the two hundred fifteth anniversary of the United States, NPR has been reporting stories that illustrate American life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. for a series called America in Pursuit The history of Motown Records is one of those quintessentially American stories. And as NPR's Don Ganye reports, it has a special significance in the motor city Detroit It seems like every Detroiter has a motown origin story. And we had the forty five of Jackson five I want you back. and then on the other forty five was Rock and Robin That's Jamon Jordan, the official historian for the city of Detroit He says Motown created a sense of pride and an identity so ingrained into the fabric of the city that you can't untangle the two Moton has become for Detroit what whole industries have become for other cities. like when we think of Milwaukee, of course, we think of beer Pittsburgh and Steel or Houston in Oil, you know? Detroit it's not just Detroit and music It's Detroit and Motown. My mama don me. You better j Mot Town Records founded in nineteen fifty nine in a modest house on West Grand Boulevard by a twenty nine year old Barry Gordy. The label quickly became so big that it gave the city itself a new nickname. The motor city was now Motown. Barry Gordy had actually worked on a forord assembly line. He would write songs in his head to break up the monotony of a shift with the machinery of the plant, keeping time And he brought some of that mindset into his recording studio. songwriters had one job, engineers another, and so on Suzanne Smith is the author of the book Dancing in the Street, Motown and the Cultural Politics of Detroit The Funk Bothers, the Mot Town studio band, I mean, they literally would play different, you know, licks or you know certain bars of music and they would break them down and there would be certain pieces of songs that they would just insert in different records, the way in which you'd put a bolt on an axle of a car, you know, in a couple of the songs they would shake car chains in the studio to create a percussion sound There were also historical factors that helped make Motown possible In the early twentieth century, Detroit saw tremendous migration of African Americans from the South That led to growing neighborhoods like Black Bottom vibrant entertainment districts like Paradise Valley Local clubs like the Flame Shbar showcase talented jazz and swing musicians Jordan says all that paved the way for Motown's success even as those neighborhoods would later be lost to federal urban renewal projects I can't take you to Paradise Valle becausecause it was destroyed when they built the I three hundred seventy five and I seventy five freeway I can't take you to the Flameesh Bar. It was destroyed when they expanded the Detroit Medical Center. I can't take you to Black Bottom. It was destroyed through urban renewal. I can't take you to those places. I can take you to Moton. I take you to the Motown Museum where I could place some Motown records for you Marian Hayden is a renowned jazz musician who is from Detroit and still lives here She got to know some of Motown's early session musicians and says you can hear the jazz roots in classic Motown recordings. Now these musicians had that special thing that jazz musicians do, which is to be able to improvise provides something that is perfect for the moment And that's what Motown captured. One example, Motown musicians took a riff from a jazz standard called Canadian Sunset and turned it into the introductory baseline of Mary Well's My Gy. Kayen demonstrates for us on her base in her living room. So then you get Nothing can be say away my go And if you're a working musician in Detroit today at any level, Hayden says you better know your mot toown catalogue If you had a party And someone says play dancing in the street, they don't expect you to go look in your folder and find a piece of music. Everybody knows it. You should know that. That universality is emblematic of what Barry Gordy wanted. songs that would appeal to a broad audience, Back and white Americans alike Let me tell you what else was going on in Detroit back then Racial tensions boiled over in the summer of nineteen sixty seven Five days of unrest left more than forty people dead, mostly at the hands of law enforcement. In other parts of the country, motown artists were still playing segregated venues. It was a stark reminder that there were limits to music's power to unify. Author Susanne Smith. White people lik listening to this music. They lik that it made him feel good, but they sure as heck didn't want to like have black people move next door Barry Gordy himself was involved in the civil Rights movement, releasing recordings of Martin Luther King's I have a Dream spepeech But worried about alienating white listeners, he pressed his artists to avoid politics and social issues in their music. didn't last Yeah That anti Vietnam War anthem by Edwin Starr topped the charts. By the early seventies, other Motown acts like Stevie Wonder and the Temptations were weighing in on the events of the era. Sgregation determation deonstrationg Despite Gordy's initial misgivings, such songs expanded Motown's impact far beyond that Detroit house where it all got started In fact, Motown's Reach was on full display in nineteen ninety when Nelson Mandela visited Detroit It was just months after his release from prison in South Africa been held for twenty seven years for challenging the country's apartheid regime. When we were in prison, We appreciateated and obidly listen to the sound of Detroy, Motartown He spoke from center field at a packed Tiger stadium Qoting Marvin Gay. Brother Rrother There's far too many of you dying I was there that night. The energy in that stadium as Mandela spoke those lyrics defies description D you bring some loveven here to That moment captured everything that Motown is, a hometown institution and a global powerhouse, an a political music label that fostered political rallying cries. Today, it is still the soundtrack of the city in clubs, at family reunions, in local parks Echoing between innings at a Tiger game And of course blasting from car windows in the summertime After reporting that story, Don found himself wondering about the next generation of Detroiters Do they get a sense of pride and shared identity from motown music? or do they groan and roll their eyes when their parents put it on in the car He visited a storied city High schoolool to find out. This is a Madrigal choir class at Cass Technical High School in Detroit a place where the legacy of Motown looms large Diana Ross of the Supremes went here, as did several members of the label's legendary studio band That history is all around this place. But how much of it do today's students really know? So you think guyss following our name. so let'ss. What are we? Zachary Temptations let you go Teacher William Harrison kicked off the discussion with a question If there were all of these other record companies and people could have records, right? Anywhere, why was there a need for a place like Motown? And student Jordan Reid had an answer. Well, segregation was going on at the time and the white labels, they didn't really want to give black people an opportunity to showcase themselves, showcase their towns because they didn't see us as people So Motown really showed that Back people, we can be elegant, we can have talent. can We can be whatever we want to be because Motown gave us the opportunity to be what we know that we are. For Djia Barnes and Brian Howard, Motown holds a deep connection to family memories. Like Black people, everybody playing Motown music at the cookouts. It's something that like now we still play it just because it brings everybody together still. It's like a real Sentimental feeling U Growing up, I used to live with my grandmother and she had this little record player that she used to play Marvin Gay songs a lot And we used to just dance to it. I mean, I had no idea what was happening in the songs, but I was just a kid moving around. I was just happy that M Nana was up and moving with me. baby For Sara Carr Motown became a source of pride and inspiration. When I was little, I didn't know much about Detroit at all, and I wasn't really proud of it because I didn't know about it. But when I grew up to learn about all the different people who came out of Motown or whoever got big from where I was from, it was very. It was eye opening to me For Jordan Reed Motown also provides a counter narrative to so much of what the world often thinks about his hometown I think a lot of times Detroit has so many negative and untrue things just put onto our reputation. and Motown, it just kind of gives us something to brag about to go against that Baby, baby . Now we should point out it wasn't all praise in this classroom, just to ask Keayton Butler and Anaya Nesbit. I personally don't really listen to Moton music. I do find it enjoyable. It's just not exactly my cup of tea. Honestly, I used to hate when my mom play all her music. I hated it so bad, but this is Moton. Yes, it would be Moton Heavy on the Marbin gaz, Iice but girl turnn us sl off' too much. J But even these critiques still came alongside appreciation. Again, Anaya Nespit. When I started listening to my music, especially like Beyonce are different artists, and when they talked about who was their inspirations or the skills that they learned and who they learned them from, I appreciate who they were inspired by more. Like I appreciate you know, Diana Ross, I appreciate Michael Jackson for giving My new artist who I listen to those skills. And there's another way Motown has stayed current through sampling and covers by newer artists And then spending most of their lives living it. However these students first encountered Motown, there was broad agreement on one thing. The music is a part of the city. And more than fifty years after these songs were released, they still resonate with young listeners here. againgain, Deja Barnes. When I was younger I ain't going through nothing for. I just want to hear about regular music. But as I get older and I can really relate to some of the stuff they talking about, the music hit different literally. L it actually means something to me now Our visit ended with a performance as the male students in the class sang an a capella version of what's going on Marvin Gay's nineteen seventy one Soul masterpiece about searching for meaning in troubled times Dan Ganye NPR News, Detroit. Before we go, we would love your feedback and questions about the show. Please email us at consider this at npr dot org if you want to get in touch Don't forget that NPR plus supportorters also get twenty percent off in the NPR shop with the code plus