50 Fun Facts About Motown

Motown began operating on January 12, 1959 under which label name?

Tamla was a second choice: Gordy wanted to call the label Tammy, after the Debbie Reynolds hit, but found that the name was already taken.

How much did Berry Gordy borrow from his family's savings fund to start the label that became Motown?

$800 came from the Ber-Berry Co-op, the Gordy family's shared savings fund, and covered his side of the deal to release Marv Johnson's Come to Me.

Hitsville U.S.A., the house Gordy bought in 1959, sits at number 2648 on which Detroit street?

West Grand Boulevard turned into a Motown campus, as the growing company took over a row of neighbouring houses on the street for its offices.

What was the Hitsville building used for before Gordy bought it in 1959?

A photographers' studio at the back of the house was converted into the recording room, while Gordy moved his family into the flat upstairs.

Under which slogan did Motown market its acts during the 1960s?

The Sound of Young America pitched the records at every teenager rather than one market, and the label's acts duly won Black and white audiences alike.

Which Barrett Strong single, later covered by the Beatles, gave Berry Gordy's company its first hit?

Money (That's What I Want), credited to Gordy and Janie Bradford, reached the national charts only once it was leased to a label with nationwide distribution.

Before music, what did the future Motown founder do professionally after dropping out of high school?

Boxer was the plan when Gordy quit school in the eleventh grade, and he fought professionally for a few years before trying record retail, a car plant and songwriting.

What kind of music did Berry Gordy's failed 1950s Detroit record shop specialise in?

Jazz was Gordy's own passion, and he stocked it over what his customers actually asked for, so the 3-D Record Mart soon went bankrupt.

Before starting his label, Berry Gordy co-wrote 'Reet Petite' and 'Lonely Teardrops' for which singer?

Jackie Wilson had the hits, but Gordy saw how little the writer earned beside the record company, which pushed him to produce and own records himself.

On which day of the week did Motown hold its weekly quality-control meetings?

Friday morning was judgment day: staff voted on the week's recordings, but Gordy kept a veto and sometimes overruled a song that had won the vote.

Who taught Motown's artists grooming, poise and social graces at the label's in-house finishing school?

Maxine Powell said her aim was to make the young Detroit singers fit to perform for kings and queens, so she drilled them to walk, talk and carry themselves like royalty.

Motown's Studio A at Hitsville, where the house band cut the hits, went by which nickname?

The Snake Pit hardly ever rested, with the house players backing the label's singers down there at nearly all hours of the day and night.

Which group of Detroit session musicians backed most Motown records from 1959 to 1972?

The Funk Brothers stayed all but unknown to the public until a 2002 documentary, Standing in the Shadows of Motown, finally put the players in the spotlight.

How did Motown session bassist James Jamerson famously pluck the strings of his bass?

Only his index finger did the plucking, a habit carried over from his years on upright bass, and the hard-working digit earned a nickname of its own: The Hook.

Motown's studio musicians went uncredited on records until which 1971 Marvin Gaye album?

What's Going On put that right: Gaye had the players' names printed on the cover, the first public credit for a band that had powered the label's hits since 1959.

The first Motortown Revue live album was recorded during a December 1962 week-long stand at which venue?

The early package tours mostly worked the 'Chitlin' Circuit', and in the South audiences were sometimes split by a police-guarded rope.

Which 1961 Marvelettes single was the first Motown record to reach No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100?

Please Mr. Postman had a working postman, Freddie Gorman, among its writers, and a 22-year-old Marvin Gaye, still a jobbing session hand, on drums.

Which 1960 Miracles single became Motown's first million-selling record?

Shop Around was remade at about 3 a.m. because Gordy wanted a faster, poppier take, and he played the piano part on the hit version himself.

Which 1970 record was the Miracles' only Hot 100 No. 1 during Smokey Robinson's years with the group?

The Tears of a Clown began as a Stevie Wonder instrumental and sat on a 1967 album for three years, until Motown's UK office picked it out as a single.

What executive title did Smokey Robinson hold at Motown from the early 1960s until after the 1988 sale?

Vice president was a working job, not an honour: when Robinson left the Miracles he came off the road to concentrate on his executive duties at the label.

Whose 1964 hit 'My Guy', written by Smokey Robinson, was her only Hot 100 No. 1?

Mary Wells walked away at her peak: she turned 21 as the record topped the chart, quit Motown for a rival label, and never had a hit on that scale again.

Under what name did the Supremes form in Detroit in 1959?

The Primettes were put together as a sister act to the Primes, a male group whose singers Eddie Kendricks and Paul Williams later went into the Temptations.

The original Supremes all grew up in which Detroit public housing project?

Brewster-Douglass made neighbours of the future stars: Mary Wilson was living there when she befriended Florence Ballard at a school talent show, and Diana Ross spent her teens in the same projects.

Which 1964 single gave the Supremes their first Hot 100 No. 1?

Where Did Our Love Go had been turned down by the Marvelettes, and the trio, known around the office as the no-hit Supremes, disliked it too before it topped the chart.

Which songwriting and production team was behind most of the Supremes' Hot 100 No. 1 singles?

Holland-Dozier-Holland left Motown in 1968 in a dispute over royalties, set up their own Invictus and Hot Wax labels, and spent years fighting the company in court.

Which 1965 single written by Smokey Robinson and Ronnie White was the Temptations' first No. 1 pop hit?

My Girl was meant for Robinson's own group, the Miracles, until the Temptations heard it and talked him into letting them record it instead.

Which Temptations record won Motown its very first Grammy Award?

Cloud Nine swapped the group's smooth soul for wah-wah guitars in the style of Sly and the Family Stone, a sound producer Norman Whitfield had at first dismissed as a passing fancy.

Which Temptations lead singer was formally fired by the other four members in June 1968?

David Ruffin had wanted the act rebilled with his own name out front, and when he skipped a show in Cleveland the other four handed him his walking papers.

As of 2024, which co-founder of the Temptations was the only surviving original member?

Otis Williams turned the group's story into its own afterlife: his 1988 memoir Temptations became a TV miniseries and then the Broadway musical Ain't Too Proud.

The Four Tops started out in Detroit in the 1950s under what original name?

The Four Aims became the Four Tops in 1956 to avoid being mistaken for the Ames Brothers, and the same four men then sang together for over forty years.

Which 1966 Four Tops single hit No. 1 on both the US pop and R&B charts?

Reach Out I'll Be There left the Tops themselves unconvinced at first, yet it became their signature song and only the second Motown single to top the UK chart.

Which sister of Motown founder Berry Gordy did Marvin Gaye marry in 1963?

Anna Gordy's marriage to Gaye ended in a divorce he turned into a record: his 1978 double album Here, My Dear chronicles the break-up from his side.

Whose 1967 'I Heard It Through the Grapevine' hit No. 2, a year before Marvin Gaye's version?

Gladys Knight & the Pips were not first to the song: the Miracles had cut it a year earlier, but that take was shelved, so theirs came out first and topped the R&B chart.

Which live 1963 single gave Little Stevie Wonder his first Hot 100 No. 1?

Fingertips caught a real scramble on tape: Wonder came back for an unplanned encore while the next act's band was setting up, and a bassist can be heard shouting "What key?"

What did Stevie Wonder win from Motown in the new deal he signed after turning 21 in 1971?

Full creative control paid off at once: writing, playing and producing for himself, he went on to make Talking Book, Innervisions and Songs in the Key of Life.

Before fronting the Vandellas, Martha Reeves worked at Motown in what job?

A&R secretary was an accident: she turned up for an audition without an appointment, was told to mind the phones for department head Mickey Stevenson, and stayed on at the desk.

The Jackson 5 formed in 1964 in which city?

The brothers from Gary, Indiana, reached Motown through Bobby Taylor of the Vancouvers, though the label's publicity handed the discovery to Diana Ross.

Gordy created which in-house songwriting and producing team to write exclusively for the Jackson 5?

The Corporation was a deliberately faceless credit: Gordy wanted no more back-room superstars, so the four writers, himself included, never saw their own names on the records.

Which Jackson brother stayed at Motown in 1975 after marrying Hazel Gordy, the founder's daughter?

Jermaine stayed loyal to his father-in-law's label when his father steered the other brothers to Epic, and in 1980 it paid off with Let's Get Serious, a Top 10 hit Stevie Wonder co-wrote and produced.

To which city did Motown move its headquarters from Detroit in 1972?

Los Angeles put Gordy beside the film business he wanted into: he moved west to launch a screen career for Diana Ross, and the company grew into film and television.

Which 1972 Motown Productions film earned Diana Ross a Best Actress Oscar nomination?

Lady Sings the Blues cast Ross as Billie Holiday in Gordy's bid to make her a film star, and the bet paid off: the picture drew five Oscar nominations.

Which entertainment company bought Motown Records from founder Berry Gordy in 1988?

MCA and its partner Boston Ventures paid $61 million for the record label alone: Gordy kept the Jobete song-publishing catalogue and his film division for himself.

Which music group absorbed the Motown label after PolyGram's 1998 sale to Seagram?

Universal Music Group was the record business Seagram already owned, so buying PolyGram let it fold the two together, and Motown came along with the rest of PolyGram's labels.

Which 1985 Commodores single, a tribute to two soul singers who died in 1984, won the group its first Grammy?

Nightshift came after Lionel Richie had left: drummer Walter Orange co-wrote it and sang lead, and it brought the Grammy that none of the Richie-era hits had won.

On the 1983 TV special 'Motown 25', Michael Jackson debuted the moonwalk while performing which song?

Billie Jean, then a new single from Thriller, followed a reunion medley with his brothers, and he slipped into the backwards glide during the song's instrumental break.

Who sang with Marvin Gaye on the 1967 duet "Ain't No Mountain High Enough"?

Tammi Terrell sang her part alone, with Gaye's voice dubbed on afterwards; that October she collapsed into his arms on stage and was later diagnosed with a fatal brain tumour.

Who preserved the Hitsville building and founded the Motown Museum there in 1985?

Esther Gordy Edwards stayed behind to run the Detroit office when the label went west, and the fans who kept knocking to peek at Studio A convinced her the old house was history worth saving.

What did Michael Jackson donate to the Motown Museum in October 1988, along with $125,000?

A fedora and a white glove came with the cheque; the glove was stolen from the museum in 1991 and recovered two days later.

Which singer took "War" to No. 1 in 1970 after Motown held back the Temptations' original as an album track?

Edwin Starr got the song because Motown feared for the Temptations' image: students were asking for a single, so the label had it re-recorded with a singer who had less to lose.

'Motown: The Musical' is based on which 1994 autobiography by Berry Gordy?

To Be Loved shares its title with a hit Gordy co-wrote in his days as a jobbing songwriter, before he founded the label whose story the memoir tells.