Smokey Robinson (Born 19/02/1940)

Forever saddled with the tag of America's greatest living poet (courtesy of Bob Dylan), Robinson has been a stalwart of the soul genre (and more particularly Motown) through much of its greatest periods - a multi-faceted talent whose reputation is based mainly on his songwriting and performing skills, but who is equally at home producing and arranging for others.

As early as 1954, he had assembled his first vocal group, crucially including the guitarist Marvin Tarplin, soon to become his regular and probably his most significant collaborator. The first release from the Miracles was 'Get A Job' but the real breakthrough came with 'Shop Around', the Miracles and Motown's first monster hit.
Over the next ten years or so, they put together a string of light soul classics - releases which became standard cover fare the world over and far too many to even begin to document here. Suffice to say, a Miracles compilation of some description is an essential staple of any soul lover's collection. Depending on your passion and cash flow, this could stretch from the excellent "Anthology Box Set" through to one of the many single CD discs available - most will delight musically, although some of the packaging often leaves a lot to be desired.
Throughout this period (and this makes Smokey very special) Robinson was also instrumental in developing the careers of many others on the Motown roster. He wrote and / or produced for the Marvelettes, Marvin Gaye, Mary Wells and, most spectacularly, for the Temptations, whose period with Smokey was, in the Primer's opinion, the greatest of many highs for the group.

1972 saw him kick off his solo career (the Miracles continued without him but only scored two further hits of any real note - 'Do It Baby' and 'Love Machine'), although it has been far less consistent, musically and commercially, than his output in the group setting. Throughout the period however, he has come up with compositions such as 'Just My Soul Responding', 'Cruisin'', 'Baby Come Close' and 'Let Me Be The Clock', all of which rolled back the years and continued to prove the muse had not deserted him. He also used the opportunity to produce albums which had a consistent thematic to them (Miracles albums had tended to be products of their time, a number of hit singles and the occasional filler) - probably the best example and most successful critically was "A Quiet Storm", but much of his solo work is worth investigating.

For those on a very tight budget, there is a single CD compilation called "Smokey Robinson and The Miracles - The Greatest Hits" (Motown 530 121-2) which combines many of the Miracles hits with a few choice cuts from Smokey's solo career (including 'Being With You', 'Just My Soul Responding', 'Quiet Storm' and 'Cruisin''). His talents as singer, arranger, writer and producer deserve deeper investigation however.