Marvin's Magic
For me, it is Marvin Gaye Week. It should be for you too. Here's why...
Forty years ago, the world lost Marvin Gaye, Jr. A ten year old Me was sitting on the floor watching TV with my mama when the news broke. My mother, thinking it was an April Fool’s joke, refused to believe a man that sang to her heart in a most intimate manner was taken away so tragically. She grieved in disbelief.
My mama introduced me to Music at a very young age. Music filled my home on a constant basis as my mother purchased 45 singles and albums religiously. Marvin was one of her favorite crooners because he appealed to her sense of romanticism. You see, my mama had the gift of love and she respected the absolute power of it. Through her teachings, exemplars and the ministry of music that she lovingly curated at our home, my mama taught me how to see the experience of living in an array of colors and vivid realities/imaginings.
Marvin is intricately connected to my childhood and as I grew into womanhood, the sensuous undertakings of his music stoked the nurtured romanticism within me as well. Marvin’s magic was love, simple as that. Despite the complexities of his life, he was in complete obedience to his soul and gave us the epithets of love, its offerings and distresses, whether he was crooning to the hoards of women who floated on every word he melodically breathed into their souls or to a troubled world that needed to explain to him and to all of us, ‘what’s going on?’ Marvin had/has a magical rendering that is similarly heard in his soul children but as the progenitor, his gift cannot be duplicated. Let’s honor him this week. He deserves to be preserved as one of the most iconic cultural translators and love ambassadors of all time.
Thank you all for sticking around. It’s been a challenging few months since the transition of my mother. But she wants this for me; sharing my love for the written word with all who care to receive. I’m here now and more is coming. Bear with me.
Marvin was amazing. I was little, but I remember Jet Magazine covering his death.