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BrotherMen
Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff, through their music answered that
call at a time when, as Kenneth Gamble says, "people were
looking for something, people were almost dead inside." That
time, the late 1960s and early 1970s, was a time when the
dreamer was dead (Martin Luther King, Jr.) but not the dream,
and we needed someone again to remind us: "Keep on children,
don't you get weary."
Leon
Huff recalled: "We went on a creative rampage." Their
music became a call to arms for my generation who were
beginning to realize and commit to obtaining the tools of education
and opportunity to come back home and save our communities in
greater numbers than ever before. Such songs as "America
We Need the Light," "Wake up Everybody"
and "Let's Clean Up the Ghetto" helped us to
"Keep on children, don't you get weary."
Yet
also in this historical point in time, the official policy of
the America government towards African Americans was becoming
"benign neglect." And though a disproportionate number
of us were coming back from Viet Nam in body bags and addicted
to drugs, a new analysis and public policy was emerging as to
the "root cause" of the Black poor, defining the cause
of Black poverty as the heading of Black families by Black single
mothers.
More
of us might have accepted that analysis if Gamble and Huff had
not responded with two songs, which today are known as Black anthems
for Black families. The songs, "I'll Always Love My Mama,"
and "Family Reunion," played and replayed from
vinyl albums to CD's, reminds us not to allow ourselves to be
defined, but that we must define and articulate our own experience.
The
late BrotherMan James A. Baldwin would agree by writing, "A
victim who can articulate his own reality is no longer a victim;
they are a threat."
So
as not to become destroyed by the changing social and economic
mood of the world and nation we found ourselves now facing, we
were also reminded by Gamble and Huff, to "create children
with wisdom in their heads" put there by mothers and fathers
and an extended community, who once again stood ready to make
sure that the next generation would not only survive, but endure.
As
for me, I was studying in a New England prep school, aware that
I was the recipient of the struggles and sacrifices of those who
had risked life and limb so as to give my generation options they
could only dream of. Many days I was lonely, but I was never
alone.
I
had my cultural markings constantly reminding me that my community
needed and expected much of me. I had the music of Brothers Kenneth
Gamble and Leon Huff.
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Artist
Biography
Since
1963, the songwriting and producing team of Gamble and Huff has
earned 175 gold and platinum records, defining an entire category
of Black popular music known as "The Sound of Philadelphia,"
and dominating the pop and R&B charts for twenty years, while
writing or co-writing over 3,000 songs.
Kenneth
Gamble and Leon Huff were awarded the prestigious Grammy Trustees
Award -- an award reserved for such musical visionaries as the
Beatles, Berry Gordy and Frank Sinatra -- from the National Academy
of Recording Arts and Sciences in 1999; they were inducted into
the National Academy of Popular Music Songwriters Hall of Fame
in 1995.
With
such performers as Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, Teddy Pendergrass,
the O'Jays, the Intruders, Lou Rawls, the Jacksons, Billy Paul,
Gene McFadden and John Whitehead, and many others, Gamble and
Huff produced such classic anthems as "Wake Up, Everybody,"
"I'll Always Love My Mama," "Family Reunion"
and "For the Love of Money."
In
interviews filmed on location in the Philadelphia International
Records studio (where the above hits were recorded), Mr. Gamble
and Mr. Huff talk about their artistic collaborations and style,
marking a period of musical history now known as the "Golden
Age" of Black Soul Music with a Message.
Also
included in BrotherMen is footage of Mr. Gamble on location in
the South Philadelphia community where he was raised and returned
in the 1980s with his wife and children to live. Mr. Gamble's
commitment to the development of the community through his Universal
Companies includes, among many projects, a charter school, a job
training center and the renovation of over 100 houses for low-income
families in the neighborhood.
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Selected
Discography
"America
We Need the Light"
By Kenneth Gamble, Donald Level & Billy Paul
Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp. (BMI)
From
the album "When Love Is New"
(Philadelphia International Records)
Performed
by Billy Paul
"Wake
Up Everybody"
By Victor Carstarphen, Gene McFadden & John Whitehead
Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp. (BMI)
Performed
by Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes
"Family
Reunion"
By Kenneth Gamble & Leon Huff
Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp. (BMI)
From
the album "Family Reunion" (Sony Music)
Performed
by The O'Jays
"I'll
Always Love My Mama"
By Kenneth Gamble, Leon Huff, Gene McFadden & John
Whitehead
Warner-Tamerlane
Publishing Corp. (BMI)
Performed
by The Intruders
"For
the Love of Money"
By Kenneth Gamble, Leon Huff and A. Jackson
Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp. O/B/O Mijac Music (BMI)
Performed
by The O'Jays
"You'll
Never Find (Another Love Like Mine)"
By Kenneth Gamble & Leon Huff
Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp. (BMI)
Performed
by Lou Rawls
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