{"id":6437,"date":"2017-03-07T08:10:00","date_gmt":"2017-03-07T13:10:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6437"},"modified":"2017-03-24T08:15:46","modified_gmt":"2017-03-24T12:15:46","slug":"detroits-music-museum-hitsville-usa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6437","title":{"rendered":"Detroit\u2019s Music Museum: Hitsville: USA"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Motown

photo: Ted Eytan, creative commons license<\/p><\/div>\n

If the button for your car radio\u2019s Oldies\u2019 station is shiny from use, there\u2019s a travel stop for you in Detroit.\u00a0 The Motown Museum<\/a>\u2019s headquarters and studio, Hitsville, USA, contained in two connected American Foursquares at 2648 West Grand Boulevard.<\/p>\n

Once success arrived, Motown founder Berry Gordy, Jr., had offices and operations departments in seven houses he owned on both sides of the street, later expanding into a ten-story office building, and eventually moving his whole operation to Los Angeles in 1972. But these buildings are the original home of the Gordy family, as well as the enterprise that created the soundtrack of the 1960s and 19970s: Stevie Wonder, The Temptations, The Supremes, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, Smokey Robinson, The Marvelettes, Marvin Gaye, the Jackson 5, and so many more.<\/p>\n

Gordie\u2019s sister Esther Gordy Edwards recognized the importance of this original spot and founded the museum in 1985. When Gordy lived there, local kids who had a musical idea were welcome day or night, under the theory that \u201cyou can\u2019t put a time limit on creativity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gordie recruited a backup band from Detroit jazz clubs, that became legendary as the Funk Brothers <\/a>(fantastic documentary about them: Standing in the Shadow of Motown<\/em>). Likewise one of his girl groups, the Andantes, served as backup singers on dozens of iconic records, from \u201cI Heard it Through the Grapevine\u201d to \u201cReach Out I\u2019ll Be There.\u201d Gordy wanted music and lyrics that were upbeat. \u201cPart storefront church gospel, part jazz joint on a Saturday night, part street corner symphony,\u201d that was the Motown Sound.<\/p>\n

Though many Motown performers became major stars, they started as neighborhood kids. They knew each other from living down the block or around the corner, and many of them weren\u2019t out of high school yet. Gordy set up an \u201cartist personal development\u201d program for them, headed by talent agent Maxine Powell, who taught grooming, poise, and social graces, to give these young people the polish that would support their success.<\/p>\n

Museum visits are conducted by tour leaders in small groups and include a brief film plus an opportunity to sing in the legendary Studio A, where so much great music was created. The costume display, sample records, and photographs of those early days are amazing, though your tour group will move ahead before you can begin to read all the captions!
\n<\/a>\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If the button for your car radio\u2019s Oldies\u2019 station is shiny from use, there\u2019s a travel stop for you in Detroit.\u00a0 The Motown Museum\u2019s headquarters and studio, Hitsville, USA, contained in two connected American Foursquares at 2648 West Grand Boulevard. … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Detroit\u2019s Music Museum: Hitsville: USA - your chance to sing in legendary Studio A!","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[266,207,64,104,78],"tags":[882,140,884,299,883,416],"class_list":["post-6437","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-history","category-music","category-promotion","category-the-morgue","category-travel","tag-berry-gordy","tag-detroit","tag-hitsville-usa","tag-jr","tag-motown","tag-real-life"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-1FP","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6437","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6437"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6437\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6439,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6437\/revisions\/6439"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}