In 1959, Ross was brought to the attention of Milton Jenkins, the manager of the local doo-wop group The Primes, by Mary Wilson. Primes member Paul Williams convinced Jenkins to enlist Ross in the sister group The Primettes, which included Wilson, Florence Ballard and Betty McGlown. Ross, Wilson and Ballard each sang lead during live performances. In 1960, Lu Pine Records signed the group and issued the Ross-led single "Tears of Sorrow" backed with the Wilson-led "Pretty Baby".Soon after winning a singing contest in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Ross approached former neighbor William "Smokey" Robinson, Jr. for an audition at the label with which he recorded, Motown Records. The group garnered the audition and impressed Motown's CEO, Berry Gordy, Jr. (who arrived at the audition during the group's performance), but declined to work with the group due to them being underaged. Undeterred, the group would stand outside the label's Hitsville USA studios hoping to grab attention, eventually providing backing vocals & hand claps for many of Motown's more established artists. Meanwhile during the group's struggling early years Ross earned pay in the day as Berry Gordy's secretary. She also served at the group's main hair stylist, make-up artist, seamstress & costume designer during this period.
The Supremes in 1965. Left to right: Florence Ballard, Mary Wilson and Diana Ross.
In 1961, having already replaced McGlown with Barbara Martin, the quartet signed with Motown Records under their new moniker, The Supremes, chosen by Florence Ballard, who was the only member to be present when the group was offered a name change. Both Ross and Wilson initially disliked the name, afraid they would be mistaken for a men's group (Ruby & The Romantics' original name was The Supremes) but the name stuck regardless.
Following Martin's exit in 1962, the group remained a trio. In 1963, Ross became the group's lead singer, as Berry Gordy felt the group could "cross over" to the pop charts with Ross' unique vocal quality, and the Ross-led "When the Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes" became the group's first Billboard Top 20 Pop single. The Supremes hit number one with "Where Did Our Love Go", a song rejected by The Marvelettes, and then achieved unprecedented success: between August 1964 and May 1967, Ross, Wilson and Ballard sang on ten number-one hit singles, all of which also made the United Kingdom Top 40.
Gordy removed Florence Ballard from the group in July 1967 and chose Cindy Birdsong, a member of Patti LaBelle and the Bluebelles, as her replacement. Shortly thereafter, he changed the group's name to Diana Ross & the Supremes.
Motown initially conceived of a solo career for Diana Ross in 1966, but did not act on it until 1968. Television specials such as TCB (1968) and G.I.T. on Broadway (1969) were designed to spotlight her as a star in her own right, and much of the later Ross-led Supremes material was recorded by Ross with session singers The Andantes, not Wilson and Birdsong, on backing vocals. By the summer of 1969, Ross began her first solo recordings. In November of the same year, three years after it was first rumored, Billboard magazine confirmed Ross's departure from the group to begin her solo career. That same year, Ross introduced Motown's newest act, The Jackson 5, to national audiences on the Hollywood Palace television variety program.
Ross recorded her initial solo sessions with a number of producers, including Bones Howe and Johnny Bristol. Her first track with Bristol, "Someday We'll Be Together", was tagged as a potential solo single, but it instead was issued as the final Diana Ross & the Supremes release. "Someday We'll Be Together" was the 12th and final number-one hit for the Supremes and the last American number-one hit of the 1960s. Ross made her final appearance with the Supremes at the Frontier Hotel in Las Vegas on January 14, 1970.
Kevon Edmonds
Kevon Edmonds (in Indianapolis, Indiana) is a singer and actor and is the 4th younger brother of famous producer/songwriter/singer Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds. Growing up, Kevon shied away from the church choir, preferring to sing for his own satisfaction. It was only during his teenage years that he joined his friends in the junior high and high school choirs.
Edmonds went to Indiana University where he began to further expand his musical ambitions. Taking I.U. Soul Revue, an extensive course in music theory, performing and the business, Edmonds began to see music as a real career. Pursuing this idea, he started the group After 7 with his brother, Melvin Edmonds, and his classmate in Soul Revue, Keith Mitchell.
The group did shows in local clubs, but on graduation went on to standard 9-5 jobs. However, brother Kenneth was moving up the ladder with L.A. Reid and when they signed a deal with Virgin Records, one of the acts they brought up was their relatives in After 7.
As a member of After 7, Kevon had some huge successes, earning a platinum album as well as several gold singles. They continued to tour the country and established themselves as one of R&B's top performing groups. After their 1995 album, Reflections, After 7 left Virgin Records due to frustrations with the label. The departure from Virgin Records allowed the members to pursue their own personal projects and over time, saw the group separate.[1]
At roughly the same time, Babyface brought his brothers, as well as siblings K-Ci and JoJo of Jodeci on for a project in a fictional group Milestone. The group performed in the movie Soul Food and had a hit single with the track "I Care About You". For a brief period, Milestone nearly became a real group, instead of just the fictional group portrayed in the movie, but label conflicts caused the project to collapse.[2]
In 1999, Kevon released his first solo album, 24/7. The title track from the album was a big hit, going gold and reaching #10 on the Hot 100. The album's second single, "No Love", performed moderately well, reaching #25 on the R&B charts.
Edmonds' second solo CD, Who Knew, is scheduled for release on October 13, 2009 through Make Entertainment/Image Distribution. The first single was released in early August and is titled "Oh."[3]
"Who Knew" has generated mainly positive reviews since its release. Thomas Leo on Grown Folks Music rated the album 4/5 citing "What he did was give r&b fans a very solid album full of good music in a time when the genre seems to be moving away from what it once was."[4]
In a recent interview, he promised fans they won't have to wait another 10 years for his next album: "I can assure you that you won’t have to wait another ten. *Laughs* “Oh yes, new album 2019, I’m going to be dropping a new album.” *Laughs* No, I’ll be back long before, that is a promise."
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