Sheldon Taylor's Souls of Black Notes

I can remember being captivated by the music as earlier as seven or eight. It started with me being intrigued by the record's blue logo with the map of Detroit or the yellow and brown Tamla imprint. The 45s and albums were always in the house. I wasn't allowed to touch them and rightfully so. As kids we trashed my mother's extensive record collection that went back to fifties. We didn't know better. As a music lover looking back, I deserved to kicked out the house or beat within an inch of my life. By the time I really got into music, t he Motown classic hits were nearly fifteen or twenty years old. The music and songwriting qualit always resonated with me. I remained  fascinated by their contemporary staying power. Motown survived many industry highs and lows, specifically skewed perceptions of its key figures. As a kid, I witnessed Black America's stiff-armed ambivalence of Diana Ross. In the 70s she was our Beyonce. In the Eighties she cast as the backs...

                                                              Picture Pendergrass at dawn, surveying Philly like a modern-day Musa/Moses on a solitary mountaintop. Rolling piano keys and soulful organ chords signal a call to prayer as he nudges society awake from its mental slumber. Recognizing the world is slipping away into Sodom-like sea of war, hatred and poverty, Teddy stresses that there is no time for looking back. The old ways are extinct, and the future is within our grasp…. The aptly named Teddy Pendergrass documentary If You Don’t Know Me arrives just in time to celebrate the late soul singer’s criminally under-recognized legacy. The film is part of a loose trilogy, coming on the heels of a 1997 Behind the Music episode and a more recent Unsung segment that aired in 2010.   If You Don’t Know Me promises to re...

                                               Hathaway Suite I: Sack Full of Dreams (Prelude) "I've done everything right. I know how to touch people. What do I have to do to get people to love me like Stevie?" Hardly words you’d expect from a gifted and multi-faceted talent at the top of his game. Producer. Arranger. Songwriter.  Television. Film scores. When the stage lights went out after another triumphant show and the money was pocketed, Hathaway poured his heart out to mentor Quincy Jones and ponder---where is the love?   Donny was quick; he was truly a genius. But he couldn’t understand why Stevie Wonder; whom I ‘d known and admired since he was 12 was more popular than him. He used to travel with $200,000 to $3000,000 in cash and he felt safe enough to call me from almost every city in America, day or night. The last time was from his gr...