Marvin Gaye Mentor Harvey Fuqua Dead

Thanks to dbuskirk for the heads up on Fuqua’s death.

Motown A&R man/songwriter/producer/etc Harvey Fuqua has died at 80 years of age. I have long known the name of Fuqua from his credits on Marvin Gaye and Surpremes records. In all these years I never knew a tenth of what he did, but any collaborator with Gaye who had the same last name as one of the coolest figures in 1970s football is cool in my book! Here’s an awesome piece from the NewBlackMan blog on Fuqua’s career and impact on other artists.

Don’t trust my reading comprehension skills (click on the links above), but it turns out Fuqua led the late-1950s R&B group The Moonglows as well as acted in an A&R capacity for the band’s label, Chess Records. Fuqua first groomed young Marvin when he joined as a member of The Moonglows. Among other achievements at Motown Fuqua is credited with teaming Marvin with his greatest duet partner, Tammi Terrell. Along with his collaboration on Gaye’s awesome final album, Midnight Love, Fuqua would continue having success producing artists into the ’70s and early ’80s, with the likes of Sylvester and The Weather Girls. Here’s a mid-’70s act he guided that I’d never heard of before now, New Birth. The totally unexpected dance break at the 1:32 mark is among the finest unexpected dance breaks in the history of televised music!

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