Rhythm Ride: A Road Trip Through the Motown Sound - Hardcover

Davis Pinkney, Andrea

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1596439734 ISBN 13: 9781596439733

Verlag: ROARING BROOK PR, 2015

Inhaltsangabe

From award-winning author Andrea Davis Pinkney comes the story of the music that defined a generation and a movement that changed the world.

Berry Gordy began Motown in 1959 with an $800 loan from his family. He converted the garage of a residential house into a studio and recruited teenagers from the neighborhood-like Smokey Robinson, Mary Wells, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, and Diana Ross-to sing for his new label. Meanwhile, the country was on the brink of a cultural revolution, and one of the most powerful agents of change in the following decade would be this group of young black performers from urban Detroit. From Berry Gordy and his remarkable vision to the Civil Rights movement, from the behind-the-scenes musicians, choreographers, and song writers to the most famous recording artists of the century, Andrea Davis Pinkney takes readers on a Rhythm Ride through the story of Motown.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Andrea Davis Pinkney is the New York Times bestselling author of more than 20 books for children, many of them illustrated by her husband Brian Pinkney. She lives with her family in Brooklyn, New York.

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Rhythm Ride

A Road Trip Through The Motown Sound

By Andrea Davis Pinkney

Roaring Brook Press

Copyright © 2015 Andrea Davis Pinkney
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-59643-973-3

Contents

Title Page, 
Copyright Notice, 
Dedication, 
Epigraph, 
A Greeting from the Groove, 
The Motor City, 
Handsome Dazzler, 
Got a Job, 
Dreaming Big for Eight Hundred Dollars, 
The Motown Family, 
My Mama Told Me, 
Factory Rhythm, 
The C Circuit, 
Miss Manners, 
Cholly's Moves, 
Dancing in the Street, 
Wonder Kid, 
The Funk Brothers, 
Ugly Sightseeing, 
Sunshine on a Cloudy Day, 
The Sound of Young America, 
Singing Supreme, 
Family Drama, 
What's Going On, 
TCB, ABC, 1-2-3-4-5, 
New Directions, 
The Groove Goes On, 
Author's Note, 
Timeline, 
Selected Discography, 
On Screen, 
Source Notes, 
For Further Enjoyment, 
Acknowledgments, 
Photo Credits, 
Index, 
About the Author, 
Copyright, 

CHAPTER 1

A GREETING FROM THE GROOVE

YOU READY, CHILD? LET'S GO.

I've got my pulse on all the roads. And side streets. And avenues. And alleyways.

You see, I steer the beat. That's why they call me the Groove.

Because my uh-huh keeps us pumping on the way. So — uh-huh, I'm the one driving this Rhythm Ride. Make no mistake, kid. I'm not a man or a woman. I'm a guide. A tempo that keeps us on track.

Hey, put that road map away. We don't need it. I know this highway. I'm clear on where I'm going — and I sure know where I've been. When you've lasted as long as I have, you learn that yesterday sets the path to today. Our past shows us where we've come from and where we're heading. The truth of it is, the Groove has been at the wheel for the whole time. That's why nobody can run me off the road. I'm here to stay. And now, I'd like to take you on a drive.

Yeah, you. Sitting pretty. Taking in the whole view from your window.

Make sure you stay alert, 'cause this Rhythm Ride is a trip —and a story about cars and stars, and a sound. It's the journey of one man's dream. That man, Berry Gordy, Jr., was an unstoppable originator. This is the true tale of how he took kids from the street and turned them into celebrities. Our drive follows Berry's vision-come-to-life. Honey, you're about to see how Berry's company put pride on the flip side of prejudice, and came to be called the Sound of Young America.

As we get ready to roll, you need to know something about the Groove. I'm blacker than midnight. And proud of it.

I've been pumped, sung, shunned, loved, let loose, danced to, segregated, and celebrated. I've driven to the beat and through it.

I've been called some names, too. Some good names — "praise tempo" and "heart-and-soul harmony."

And other names that put some painful scratches on my shiny black vinyl — names like "race music" and "darkie sounds."

Yeah, I've seen good days and bad.

Highs.

Lows.

In-betweens.

But I'm tough. I've got grit, deep down. I don't ever give up. I've stood the test of time.

Sweetie, before we get started, I need to warn you. There are happy places along this road and sad ones, too. Every time I take a kid on this ride, they come home changed. Different. Rhythm has a way of doing that. It stirs you up, then sets you down on higher ground.

You think you can handle it? Good.

Stick with the Groove.

Here we go.

On a Rhythm Ride.

To a place.

Called Motown.

CHAPTER 2

THE MOTOR CITY

BUCKLE UP, BABY. SETTLE IN.

Our trip begins with Berry Gordy, Jr., a kid who always kept his motor running. Berry lived with his family in Detroit, Michigan. In the late 1920s, when he was born, Detroit was a boomtown for African Americans. "The Motor City" was what folks called the sidewalks and streets that wove together their community. Detroit's pulse got its beat from the Ford Motor Company, the automotive industry's biggest employer of black men and women, and the only company that had come to an agreement with the United Auto Workers that prohibited discrimination based on race or skin color.

When someone new came to town, they immediately went to Ford to get a job. If a child was born in Detroit, people joked that the baby bounced from Henry Ford Hospital to the Ford Motor Company assembly belt, where he or she would spend the rest of his or her days shaping fenders, tweaking headlights, or slapping car doors onto hot-off-the-line Model 59s.

Ford paid higher salaries than any other automotive company. At Ford, workers had the widest range of job opportunities. You could start as a welder and work your way up to foreman. There were many who took great pride in working at Ford and liked the camaraderie found on the assembly line.

But being employed by Ford wasn't all sparkling hubcaps and happy car horns. For some, making cars could be grueling. From morning to night, workers spent hours doing the same tasks again and again, with only two fifteen-minute breaks a day.

It went like this:

Stand ... snatch ... bend ... attach ...

Stand ... snatch ... bend ... attach ...

Also, the place was loud. It smelled like sweat and chrome polish. The bright lights made it hot. If you were lucky enough to be stationed near one of the small windows, there was no time to take even a quick look outside. For many folks, the paycheck made the long days and stale air bearable. But for others, it was tedious grunt work, not worth the money.

Berry's parents, Berry Gordy, Sr., and Bertha, owned a few successful businesses, which meant they didn't have to work for Ford. They were entrepreneurs who took pride in running their family establishments, and they taught their children the value of hard work.

Berry's father was a professional carpenter and plasterer. He also operated the Booker T. Washington General Store, his own grocery store named after the noted educator. And he was the owner of a local printing shop called Gordy Printing Shop.

Berry's mother cofounded the Friendship Mutual Life Insurance Company, a small business whose primary purpose was to provide affordable insurance policies to African American families.

As soon as the Gordy children were old enough to help their dad mix plaster or carry wood planks for his carpentry jobs, or stock shelves at their family grocery store, or hoist stacks of paper at the Gordy Printing Shop, or answer the phone at their mom's insurance company, they were put to work.

Berry's sisters, Loucye, Esther, Anna, and Gwen, and his brothers, Fuller, George, and Robert, went along with their family's way of doing things. They were focused students who brought home good grades and worked in their parents' establishments with little complaint.

Berry, Jr., the next-to-youngest child, wasn't like his siblings. He hated manual labor. He worked in his parents' businesses, but he did it with an attitude.

Berry didn't like how plastering got his hands dirty. Working with wood gave him splinters. Stacking cans of peas and piles of paper was boring.

Schoolwork for Berry was the same — misery.

When it came time for the Gordy kids to show their parents their report cards, Berry wasn't so eager to share what looked like a tribute to the fourth and sixth letters of the alphabet. Berry's parents weren't happy about his grades, but the...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: ROARING BROOK PR
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2015
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1596439734
• ISBN 13: 9781596439733
• Einband: Gebundene Ausgabe
• Anzahl der Seiten: 176
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Buchpark GmbH; gpsr@buchpark.de; ; Krügerweg 1; Trebbin; Brandenburg; 14959; Deutschland