2015-12

The Wonder of ‘Obama’s
I
can’t be the only person who
remembers singing ‘You are
the sunshine of my life’ or ‘I
just called to say I love you’ at
school.
It’s testimony to Stevie Wonder’s
talent as a musician and performer
that these simple, synthesised
tunes remain so catchy and
singable decades after they were
first recorded. Yes, there’s a certain
cheesiness about them, but they
bear testimony to his consistency and
longevity in a fickle industry where
many come and go.
Incredibly, Stevie Wonder has been
Stevie Wonder
Photo by Antonio
Cruz/ABr - Agência
Brasil.. Licensed
under CC BY 3.0
br via
Wikimedia
Commons
going strong, swaying behind his
trademark dark glasses, ever since
his remarkable talent as an 11-yearold
was spotted. The young Steveland
honed his musical skills by singing
in the church choir, listening to blues
and jazz on the radio, playing on the
neighbour’s piano and performing on
street corners with a friend.
His first album for Motown (as
‘Little Stevie Wonder’) came out in
1962. The following year, the album
‘The 12 Year Old Genius’ rocketed to
No.1 in the charts. The singles and
albums which followed covered a
range of musical styles, from those
synthesised love songs, to pop (‘Part
time lover’) and the seriously funky
(‘Signed, sealed, delivered’). They’re
not all suitable for school choirs, but
there are a lot of good tunes in there.
Naturally, it’s not only his music
but the fact that he’s been so
successful even though he’s blind
that fascinates people.
He hasn’t seen his blindness
as a particular handicap,
however. In an article for
Rolling Stone Magazine, his
then assistant remembered
being in Puerto Rico on a sunny
day and Wonder saying it was
going to rain. “He said he could
smell the moisture in the air, and
we were all laughing at him. Three
hours later, sure enough, it came. A
hailstorm!”
Wonder himself has observed:
“Being blind, you don’t judge books by
their covers; you go through things
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