To Be Loved: The Music, the Magic, the Memories of Motown [Paperback]

Berry Gordy (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1995

From the streets of Detroit to the hills of Hollywood, Gordy tells of all the people who have influenced his life and rebuts the gossip, rumors and myths that have surrounded him and his legendary company. Here is the personal story of the man behind the Motown Sound who changed American music with such artists as Diana Ross, The Jackson 5, and Smokey Robinson.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

As founder and president of Motown Records, Gordy launched and developed the careers of many of the most talented pop musicians of our day, including Mary Wells, Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye, Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson. He here recounts how, in 1959 with a $800 loan from his family, he started the label he ultimately expanded into an entertainment empire, despite the racial prejudices he and his staff encountered. In 1988, he sold Motown to MCA for $61 million. His self-portrait, not surprisingly, is more flattering-many will consider the book an apologia-than the blistering memoirs written by several Motowners, among them Martha Reeves's Dancing in the Streets, coauthored with Mark Bego; and his former wife Raynoma Gordy Singleton's Berry, Me, and Motown. On his part, though, the 56-year-old Gordy is blithely generous to all: "I've seen how important family always was to me, whether it was the family I grew up with, the Motown family or my family today of eight children and ten grandchildren." Photos. Author tour.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Founder of the Motown empire, Gordy has written a revealing autobiography dealing with the interplay between his private life and his recording and motion picture ventures. He begins with his childhood in Detroit and his forays into music as owner of a jazz-record store and successful songwriter for singer Jackie Wilson. Citing civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and the auto assembly lines as inspirations, Gordy charts the rise of the Motown hit machine, which manufactured a close-knit stable of well-groomed African American performers-including the Supremes, the Temptations, and the Jackson 5-who brought a gospel-based pop to white America during the Sixties and Seventies. Throughout the book, the music entrepreneur portrays his personal life and his business as inseparably connected, including comments about his five-year affair with Diana Ross. He ends with the sale of Motown in 1988. Though offering little new information, this believable and highly readable account of the most successful African American- owned entertainment operation will be requested by Motown fans. Recommended for most public libraries. [This should complement the regrettably out-of-print story of Motown, Berry, Me and Motown by Raynoma Gordy Singleton, Gordy's wife and business partner.-Ed.]-David Szatmary, Univ. of Washington, Seattl.
--David Szatmary, Univ. of Washington, Seattle
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 445 pages
• Publisher: Warner Books (December 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446602361
• ISBN-13: 978-0446602365
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #526,920 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #14 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Arts & Literature > Composers & Musicians > Rhythm & Blues

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars OVERLY VARNISHED AND ONE-SIDED, April 14, 2005

By 

VINCENT P TARSITANO (PORT ORANGE, FL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: To Be Loved: The Music, the Magic, the Memories of Motown : An Autobiography (Hardcover)

Like his main protege' Diana Ross' book SECRETS OF A SPARROW, I found this autobiography, TO BE LOVED, a bit too self-flattering and unapologetic.

Berry Gordy's story is extremely fascinating, his accomplishments in, and contributions to, American music are absolutely gargantuan. He deserves a great deal of credit for having created the conditions for an unmatched musical legacy to flourish. The lore surrounding the founding and early development of his great musical empire is almost as wonderful and engaging as the music itelf. You DO get some of that here.

Gordy also explains many of his business decisions. From most accounts, Mr. Gordy and his family were astute business people. However, Gordy's single-mindedness could often cause him to ignore or underplay some of the artist's gifts, appeal and marketability. For example, great as Diana Ross' star potential was, other female artists, even within the Supremes, were not as fully developed as they deserved to be, while Diana was given "special" opportunities in the way of extraordinary classes [beyond Motown's famous Artist Development]in modeling, etc. Was this purely a "business" decision? In the meantime, artists such as Kim Weston and Brenda Holloway, both quite gifted vocally, and very attractive physically, basically languished at the label.

Gladys Knight and The Pips, while having had moderate success at Motown, but not given that "extra push," absolutely exploded after they left the label, had huge sales, and were awarded several Grammy awards.

The Spinners fared even worse at Motown. But after they left the label they had phenomenal success in the early-mid seventies with singles and album sales. Many of those singles are considered r&b classics.

Was there just too much talent at Motown for all of it to be promoted as deserved? Was Mr. Gordy too hands-on during those years?

I wasn't satisfied with Mr. Gordy's take on some of these situations. As a huge Supremes' fan, I was especially dissatisfied with his matter-of-fact comment that, within the original group, Diana had the "sparkle," and Mary Wilson and Florence Ballard didn't, to paraphrase. People loved all 3 Supremes, and us fans recognized the magic and potential in all three. The fate of Florence Ballard is especially sad. She was dead [of a broken heart?] at age 32, just about 9 years after her ousting from that group. Her replacement within the Supremes was literally waiting in the wings to take over, between the early evening and later performance at a Las Vegas casino in July, 1967, when Flo was fired from the group. Was this also, a purely business decision? Was Mr. Gordy willing to hear Flo's grievances about being relegated more and more to the background, when the fans loved her to be featured, and by many accounts, she was the "founder" of the group?

I really prefer Mary Wilson's unvarnished take on the Supremes' story, as presented in her wonderful books DREAMGIRL and SUPREME FAITH [both available in one volume]. She tells it like it is, and, along the way, exposes her own warts and blemishes, but also comes across as a rounded, real, fallible, wonderful person. TO BE LOVED didn't have nearly enough of that.

DREAMGIRL sold like hotcakes, while Mr. Gordy's book did rather poorly. Ms. Ross' book also sold poorly. A lesson??? If you're going to do a memoir, people will really relate more the more real you relate.

11 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Oh please, January 1, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: To Be Loved: The Music, the Magic, the Memories of Motown : An Autobiography (Hardcover)

I'm amazed at the almost uniformly positive reviews of this book by other readers here. Berry Gordy accomplished a great deal by founding Motown Records, no question about it (what he did for African American culture in general is immeasurable); what I object to is his (predictible, but no less shocking) glossing over of many unpleasant facts in this book. The fact is, Gordy was a mean and ruthless businessman who stomped on countless others in his rise to the top (the part he played in the downfall of Florence Ballard alone is unforgivable); his warm and fuzzy recounting of his and Motown's story simply reads false to me. Better books on this subject are J. Randy Taraborelli's Motown book, his biography of Diana Ross, and the two Mary Wilson autobiographies. Those read quite a bit more convincingly.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not enough music and memories and magic!, October 3, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: To Be Loved: The Music, the Magic, the Memories of Motown (Paperback)

This book is great for those who don't know the truth about the humblebeginnings of Berry Gordy and his Detroit empire. Berry Gordy gives us no insight into the recording sessions and no credit to the background singers, or the background musicians. Oh he compliments them for being a part of the Motown success story this book is nothing more than a couple of recollections of Motown history and for that it deserves 3 stars. He does not get into what really happened between Florence and Diana and Mary and that fateful day of her dismissal...There is no mention of how the recording sessions went with Holland-Dozier_Holland, Mickey Stevenson, Ashford and Simpson and others. The early picture of the Supremes as the Primettes is worth the price of the book alone.