R&B/Soul Singer Teena Marie Has Died | Photos | Videos | Sounds | Obits | Musicians' Thoughts

http://www.cnn.com/2010/SHOWBIZ/Music/12/28/teena.marie.dead/index.html?hpt=T1

Berry Gordy's Shock...

Autopsy scheduled for singer-songwriter Teena Marie

By the CNN Wire Staff
December 28, 2010 2:46 a.m. EST
Photo: Celebration of Motown in 2007. Teena Marie sang to Motown founder Berry Gordy at a 50th anniversary celebration of Motown in 2007.

(CNN) -- An autopsy will be conducted Tuesday on the body of R&B singer-songwriter Teena Marie, according to the Los Angeles County coroner's office.

It was not immediately clear when the results would be available, but the coroner's office said it hopes to have the autopsy completed on Tuesday.

The artist was found dead Sunday at her California home.

Marie was found dead by her daughter after apparently dying in her sleep, manager Mike Gardner said.

"I am horrified by the sudden death of my darling Teena Marie," Motown founder Berry Gordy said in a statement sent by his publicist. "She was my 'baby,' always true to herself, always true to her heart."

Berry called her a "powerhouse performer, writer, producer and arranger."

"When I first auditioned her she was so awesome she blew me away," Gordy said. "She had so much soul -- the only thing white about her was her skin."

CNN's Roland S. Martin and Denise Quan contributed to this report.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2010/12/27/132368140/teena-marie-ivory-queen-...

NPR...

The Ivory Queen Of Soul, Has Died

04:17 pm

by Jacob Ganz

December 27, 2010

Lady T. Vanilla Child. The Ivory Queen of Soul. Mary Christine Brockert earned all kinds of nicknames over the course of her career. The one most people knew was Teena Marie.

Marie died yesterday at home in Pasadena, at the age of 54. A white woman whose exceptional voice made her a success in the traditionally black genres of soul, R&B and funk, her career began on Motown in the late 1970s. The cover of her 1979 debut album, Wild and Peaceful, didn't feature her photo; Marie later said that Motown chief Berry Gordy wanted people to listen to her voice without getting distracted by the color of her skin.

Talking to Audie Cornish on All Things Considered on Monday, University of Pennsylvania music professor Guthrie Ramsay explained Teena Marie's talent in technical terms:

"She sings with a very robust chest voice but she also has what we call a coloratura range. And that is, she can sing — I tested it out — she's singing high Cs, high C sharps. And she moves effortlessly through the range of her voice; she has a signature and very fluid melisma — singing lots of notes on one syllable. And although her voice had a naturally wide vibrato, there was a sense that she was very much in control of it."

Rick James was one of many fans of Marie's voice. The two were romantically involved for years, and made songs like "Fire and Desire" and "I'm a Sucker for Your Love" together.

Marie had an acrimonious split with Motown; she filed a suit against the company that led to a law preventing record labels from keeping a musician on contract but refusing to release records. Ramsay says that Marie came into an industry that was in transition, and sometimes hesitant to embrace unconventional artists.

"You had some of the smaller labels being bought by larger corporations, and at that time they began to exercise a lot more artistic control over these artists in terms of what kind of music they wanted them to put out and what kind of image they wanted them to have. So she kind of stood out as an anomaly because first of all she was a white woman singing very soulful songs throughout all of the genres. She was participating in R&B ballads. She sang over funk songs. She did pop songs. Her "Ooh La La La" song is an early smooth jazz type of song. So she was really quite ambitious in her stylings, but at the same time she had to fight record labels in order to get the full range of her musicality out there."

Marie continued recording for labels like Epic and Cash Money; she recorded hits like "Ooh La La La," "Fix It" and "Lovergirl" in the '80s. Her final album, Congo Square, was released in 2009 on Stax.

Ramsay says Teena Marie's connection with soul was deep.

"She was a person who personified the idea that culture is learned. And for whatever reason, she was raised in a situation where she was exposed to soul music, R&B music, and she embraced it as her own. She believed that if it moved her, she could be part of it."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203731004576046064169044194.html?m...

The Wall Street Journal...

Teena Marie 1956-2010
'Ivory Queen' Reigned on R&B Charts

By STEPHEN MILLER

Said to have a voice that launched a thousand babies, Teena Marie was one of the first white women to score hits consistently on the R&B charts. And though never the diva, she liked to call herself "The Ivory Queen of Soul."

The singer, composer and producer died Sunday at age 54 at her home in California of what the Associated Press said were natural causes.

Teena Marie was born Mary Christine Brockert. Her parents, a carpenter and a childcare worker, were devotees of Harry Belafonte and Lena Horne. The family's beachside Los Angeles enclave, Venice, was alive with the sounds of Sly and the Family Stone, the Jackson 5 and Latin music.

[REM.TEENA] Getty Images

Teena Marie onstage in 1984.

In her 1981 song "Square Biz" she touched on her influences: "I like spirituals and rock/Sarah Vaughan, Johann Sebastian Bach/Shakespeare, Maya Angelou/and Nikki Giovanni just to name a few."

Signed by Motown in 1976, she languished before being discovered by the funk legend Rick James, also on Motown at the time. Her first album, "Wild and Peaceful," came out in 1979 and featured "I'm a Sucker for Your Love," an up-tempo duet with and written by Mr. James that reached No. 8 on the Billboard R&B Singles chart.

When Teena Marie's early records sold modestly despite the obvious talents of the singer, Newsweek magazine opined in 1980, "'Lady T, who is white, may be the oddest casualty of radio's color barrier: because she sounds black, most white pop stations won't touch her records."

Mr. James and Teena Marie had by then by then established a personal as well as business relationship. "She's the most important female singer since Barbra Streisand; and her own race forgot her," Mr. James told People magazine in 1985. Teena Marie estimated in 2005 that 90% of her audience was black women.

Her early career climaxed with 1981's "It Must Be Magic," which finished the year at No. 23 on Billboard's overall chart, and No. 2 in R&B. It included the languorous "Portuguese Love" and "Square Biz," which featured a rap section about one of the diminutive singer's favorite themes:

"I've been called Casper, Shorty, Lil' Bit/And some they call me Vanilla child/But you know that don't mean my world to me/Cause baby names can't cramp my style"

She was among the first female singers to put rap to vinyl—the same year as Deborah Harry in Blondie's 1981 hit "Rapture."

Ms. Brockert started performing at age 8. She had a bit part in an episode of "The Beverly Hillbillies," appeared in commercials, and ended up being cast in a TV pilot called "Orphanage Children" produced by Motown.

After four albums with Motown, she sued to break her contract. She went on to score her biggest hit, the rocked-out "Lovergirl," in 1984. continued to tour, often with Mr. James, with whom she remained close. In recent years, she liked to bring her daughter onstage for duets. Teena Marie released "La Doña" in 2004, her first new record in a decade. The record sold well, as did two follow-ups, "Sapphire" in 2006 and "Congo Square" in 2009.

Teena Marie has been cited as an influence by such acts as the Fugees and Mary J. Blige.

In a 2007 interview, Ms. Blige told the Wall Street Journal that she recalled singing the Teena Marie song "Yes Indeed" into a hairbrush before a mirror.

http://www.mtv.com/news/photos/m/marie_teena_101227/06_teena_marie.jpg

Smokey Robinson and Teena Marie at a 50th anniversary celebration of Motown on October 20, 2007

Photo by Bill Pugliano/Getty Images

http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1654910/20101227/marie_teena.jhtml

Dec 27 2010 8:10 AM EST 49,429

Teena Marie Remembered By Diddy, Mary J. Blige

'R.I.P Teena Marie. God Bless. Damn I just saw her the other day,' Diddy tweets.

By Jocelyn Vena

The music world was stunned to find out that legendary R&B singer Teena Marie died over the weekend. The singer was just 54 and left a lasting influence on many of today's contemporary artists, who immediately reacted to the singer's death. Marie's peers also shared their memories of the singer as the rest of the world was still learning of her death.

Diddy tweeted: "R.I.P Teena Marie. God Bless. Damn I just saw her the other day."

Mary J. Blige also took to Twitter to pay her final respects to the influential artist, who was a friend and protégé of Rick James'. "Rest in peace Teena Marie," Blige wrote. "My Love for u is forever."

Common cited their shared astrological sign as a reason he felt so connected to her music. "Teena and I are both Pisces and we believe that we've been here before," he tweeted. "That's why 'De Ja Vu' is my favorite song."

Fellow music "it" girl, Prince protégé Sheila E, also shared how much she will miss the singer on Twitter. "I will miss my girl Teena Marie, Real music by real people. God bless my sistah and her family. U will be missed."

R&B songwriting duo Kenneth Gamble & Leon Huff, who wrote hits like "If You Don't Know Me by Now," the "Soul Train" theme song and "Back Stabbers," remembered the singer in a statement: "We're shocked and deeply saddened by the sudden loss of Teena Marie. She was one of the most memorable, soulful and unique R&B vocalists to come out of Motown. We send our condolences to Teena's family, the entire Motown family and of course, our dear friend Berry Gordy."

Eddie Levert, founder of the O'Jays, recalled Marie's personal and professional contributions in a statement to CNN. "There are a lot of black people who swore by her and believed in her, as far as her music was concerned," he said. "She was a good mom, and to me, that is saying a lot.''

Marie was known for hits like "Lovergirl" and "Square Biz." Her daughter found her dead Saturday night, Marie's manager said. No cause of death has been released, but her publicist said Marie suffered a grand mal seizure a month ago, from which she was still recovering.

http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1654945/20101227/marie_teena.jhtml

Dec 27 2010 2:18 PM EST 12,942

Teena Marie Remembered By Lenny Kravitz, Swizz Beatz, Q-Tip

Kravitz dubs Marie a 'treasure' as he recalls her generosity when he was starting out in music.

By Mawuse Ziegbe

Teena Marie's sudden death is hitting many of the late R&B veteran's friends and family hard, including her onetime mentee-turned-rock star Lenny Kravitz.

In a video posted on the rocker's YouTube channel, Kravitz, looking sullen in a dark hoodie, reveals that he woke up in Paris to the news of Marie's passing and opens up about her generosity and assistance when he was starting his career as a teen.

"I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for Teena. She took me in when I was around 16. I was just a musician on the street. I was living from pillar to post. She took me in, she gave me a bedroom, she fed me, she cooked for me, she took care of me. She gave me instruments to play, she took me to all her recording sessions. She took me to concerts, she nurtured me and helped me to become who I am," Kravitz says. He added that although he hadn't publicly discussed their relationship before now and lost touch in the years before her death, he's still grateful for everything she did for him in those early years.

"I've never really talked much about it in depth, but I would not be here. She changed my life, not only as an artist, but as a person who truly loved me for who I was. We'd been out of contact for the last few years, but I just want to say, Teena, that I will always love and respect you," he says. "Thank you for being my friend. Thank you, Father, for the life of Teena Marie."

The "Again" singer also sent condolences to Marie's loved ones and touted the late songstress' many skills.

"I just want to send all my love and respect out to the family and I just want to say Teena Marie was a treasure, was a genius," he says. "Composer, arranger, singer, musician, unique, underrated by far."

Kravitz is one of many celebs who have paid tribute to the late star, who was found dead in her California home on Sunday. Swizz Beatz recently tweeted, "R.I.P TO ONE OF THE BEST VOICES OF MUSIC TEENA MARIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" before announcing that he would push back his weekly Monster Monday release in honor of Marie.

Missy Elliott tweeted, "My Prayers go out to Teena Marie's family. Teena created music that is Timeless! Songs sung with soul and conviction a True LEGEND!"

Fashion mogul Kimora Lee Simmons wrote, "RIP to the legendary Ms Teena Marie. Luv u always! We'll celebrate + sing in your memory!"

A Tribe Called Quest MC Q-Tip reminisced on Twitter about how Marie's music touched another late star, Run-DMC's Jam Master Jay, who loved the soul great's rendition of "If I Were a Bell." He also urged rising soul stars to pick up Marie's torch, typing, "hopefully a young singer can take this blueprint she left. RIP."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/27/AR2010122700554....

Washington Post...

Teena Marie, known as 'Ivory Queen of Soul,' dies

FILE - In this July 5, 2009 file photo, Teena Marie performs during the Essence Music Festival at the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans. Marie, who made history as Motown's first white female act but developed a lasting legacy with her silky soul pipes and with hits like "Lovergirl," "Square Biz," and "Fire and Desire" with mentor Rick James, has died. She was 54. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, File) (Patrick Semansky - AP)

By NEKESA MUMBI MOODY
The Associated Press
Monday, December 27, 2010; 5:07 PM

LOS ANGELES -- Teena Marie's last album, "Congo Square," was titled after a historical meeting place for slaves in New Orleans, featured a tribute to Martin Luther King's widow and also song "Black Cool," written for President Barack Obama.

No matter that Marie, 54, was white. The R&B legend revered and fully immersed herself in black culture - and in turn was respected and adored by black audiences, not only for her immense soulful talents, but for her inner soul as well.

"Overall my race hasn't been a problem. I'm a Black artist with White skin. At the end of the day you have to sing what's in your own soul," she told Essence.com in an interview last year while promoting "Congo Square." That album would turn out to be her last.

The self-proclaimed "Ivory Queen of Soul," whose many classic hits included "Lovergirl," Square Biz" and the scorching duet "Fire and Desire" with mentor Rick James, was found dead in her Pasadena home on Sunday at the age of 54. Authorities said her death appeared to be of natural causes.

In an interview with The Associated Press last year, Teena Marie said she had successfully battled an addiction to prescription drugs; she had been performing over the last year.

"The enduring influence of Teena's inspirational, trailblazing career, could only have been made possible through her brilliant song-writing, showmanship and high energy passion which laid the ground work for the future generations of R&B, hip-hop, and soul," said Concord Music Group chief label officer, Gene Rumsey; Concord's Stax Records released her last album.

"We feel extremely fortunate to have worked with a visionary who changed music in indelible ways. Our deepest sympathies go out to her family, friends and of course, millions of fans around the world."

Marie certainly wasn't the first white act to sing soul music, but she was arguably among the most gifted and respected, and was thoroughly embraced by black audiences, and beyond.

Even before she started her musical career, she had a strong bond with the black community, which she credited to her godmother. She gravitated to soul music and in her youth decided to make it her career.

Marie made her debut on the legendary Motown label back in 1979, becoming one of the very few white acts to break the race barrier of the groundbreaking black-owned record label that had been a haven for black artists like Stevie Wonder, the Jackson Five, the Supremes and Marvin Gaye.

The cover of her debut album, "Wild and Peaceful," did not feature her image, with Motown apparently fearing black audiences might not buy it if they found out the songstress with the dynamic, gospel-inflected voice was white.

"(Motown founder Berry) Gordy said that is was so soulful that he wanted to give the music an opportunity to stand on its own merit. Instead of my face, they put a seascape, so by the time my second album came out people were like, Lady T is White?" she told Essence.com.

"She had so much soul - the only thing white about her was her skin," said Gordy in a statement released Monday. "She was a powerhouse performer, writer, producer and arranger. Anyone who ever saw her perform, alone or with Rick James, will never forget how exciting music can be. ... Teena Marie will always be a part of the Motown family. We will all miss her."

Marie was the protege of the masterful funk wizard James, with whom she would have long, turbulent but musically magical relationship.

Marie notched her first hit, "I'm A Sucker for Your Love," with the help of James on that album. But the time her second album was released, her face was known - and on the cover of the record. But there was not a backlash - she would only get more popular on her way to becoming one of R&B's most revered queens. During her tenure with Motown, the singer-songwriter and musician produced passionate love songs and funk jam songs like "Need Your Lovin'," "Behind the Groove."

Marie's voice was the main draw of her music: Pitch-perfect, piercing in its clarity and wrought with emotion, whether it was drawing from the highs of romance or the mournful moments of a love lost. But her songs, most of which she had a hand in writing, were the other major component of her success.

Tunes like "Cassanova Brown" "Portuguese Love" and "Deja Vu (I've Been Here Before)" featured more than typical platitudes on love and life, but complex thoughts with rich lyricism. "Deja vu" was a song about reincarnation.

And "Fire and Desire," a duet with James about a former couple musing about their past love, was considered a musical masterpiece and a staple of the romance block on radio stations across the country.

Marie left Motown in 1982 and her split became historic: She sued the label and the legal battle led to a law preventing record labels from holding an artist without releasing any of their music.

She went to Epic in the 1980s and had hits like "Lovergirl" and "Ooo La La La" but her lasting musical legacy would be her Motown years.

Still, she continued to record music and perform. In 2004 and 2006 she put out two well-received albums on the traditional rap label Cash Money Records, "La Dona" and "Sapphire."

James, who had a romantic relationship with Marie but also a long friendship, died in 2004. His death shook her so she said she became addicted to Vicodin, which she had been taking for pain, for about a year.

But Marie said she successfully battled that addiction.In 2008, she talked about her excitement of being honored by the R&B Foundation.

Marie was the mother of a teenage daughter who was budding singer; she would sometimes bring her daughter onstage to sing during her shows.

In 2009, she celebrated 30 years in the recording industry, and planned for many more.

"All in all, it's been a wonderful, wonderful ride," she told The Associated Press in 2008. "I don't plan on stopping anytime soon."

http://pitchfork.com/news/41074-teena-marie-rip/

Pitchfork...

Sunday, December 26

The R&B legend dies at home
Teena Marie R.I.P.

CNN reports that the R&B legend Teena Marie has died. Lady T, born Mary Christine Brockert, was an explosive singer with a gift for wrapping her voice around the mutating strands of soul music that bubbled up throughout the 1980s. No cause of death has been reported yet, but manager Mike Gardner tells CNN that her daughter found her body after she apparently died in her sleep. Marie was 54.

Marie signed to Motown in the late 70s and became a protégé of the label's reigning star, Rick James. James wrote and produced tracks on her 1979 debut album, Wild and Peaceful, and two of her iconic early songs were duets with James: Her own lithe funk jam "I'm Just a Sucker for Your Love" and "Fire and Desire", a key track on James' landmark 1981 album Street Songs.

On successive albums, Marie came into her own as a writer and producer as well as a singer, and she scored R&B hits including the disco warm-up "I Need Your Lovin'", the funk smash "Square Biz", the burbling synth monster "Fix It", and the crossover dance-pop hit "Lovergirl". In 1983, Marie left Motown for Epic after an ugly legal battle. And across her Motown and Epic albums, there's a serious genre-blending streak at work; the iconoclastic rock critic Chuck Eddy even named her 1986 LP Emerald City one of the greatest heavy metal albums of all time in his book Stairway to Hell.

Marie's career as a hitmaker faded during the late 80s, but she was considered an R&B eminence for the rest of her life. During the past decade, she released two albums on Cash Money. Her final album, 2009's Congo Square, came out on Stax.

Check out some video and audio of Marie's work below.

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/2010/12/26/2010-12-26_soul_singer_teena...

Soul singer Teena Marie, known for 'Lovergirl,' dead at 54

BY Nina Mandell
New York DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Sunday, December 26th 2010, 9:18 PM
Teena Marie was found dead in her California home, according to reports.
Jones/AP/Universal

R&B singer Teena Marie was found dead in her California home on Sunday morning, according to numerous reports.

The singer-songwriter was 54.

Teena Marie was born Marie Christine Brockert and rose to fame thanks to her partnership with the late funk legend Rick James.

The soulful singer was best known for her hits such as "Lovergirl" and racked up 13 studio albums, six of which went platinum on the U.S. R&B charts.

The cause of the singer's death was not immediately known but CNN reported that the singer suffered a seizure while watching a movie.

Eerily on Christmas Day the singer tweeted a Sarah Vaughan song lyric: "May you never grow old, and may I never die."

The reaction to her death spread quickly across the music and social media world.

Legendary R&B singer Eddie Levert told CNN that "A lot of black people swore by her and believed in her, as far as her music was concerned."

Fans also mourned the singer’s death.

"The girl could sing," one fan wrote on Facebook. "I mean she could 'throw down'. I have to give her her props!"

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/2010/12/26/2010-12-26_soul_singer_teena...

http://images.uulyrics.com/cover/t/teena-marie/album-la-dona.jpg

La Dona album cover

http://www.ajc.com/news/r-b-singer-teena-788408.html

9:14 p.m. Sunday, December 26, 2010

R&B singer Teena Marie dead, according to media reports

By Ty Tagami

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

CNN and other media were reporting Sunday night that singer Teena Marie had died.

The cable television network reported on its website that Marie's manager Mike Gardner confirmed the death of Marie, 54.

The AJC has not independently confirmed the news. But earlier Sunday night, Philadelphia radio station WDAS posted a short announcement of her death on its website and on its broadcast streamed over the Internet. The radio station cited no source, but said details would be forthcoming.

Marie was scheduled to play the Fox Theatre in Atlanta on New Year’s Day.

Marie gained prominence in the late 1970s and '80s, and worked with funk legend Rick James.

Two of her album's went platinum and six achieved gold status, according to the website Internet Movie Database. The site says her biggest hit was the 1984 single "Lovergirl."‘

http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2010/12/26/singer-teena-marie-dead-at-54/

CNN...

R&B Singer Teena Marie dead at 54

December 26th, 2010
08:43 PM ET

Teena Marie, an award-winning singer-songwriter known for her R&B
performances, has died, her manager said Sunday. The performer was 54.