Jack Leroy Wilson Jr. was a tenor with a four-octave range and was nicknamed “Mr. Excitement”. He was a prominent figure in the transition of rhythm and blues into soul and was considered a master showman, and one of the most dynamic singers and performers in pop, R&B, and rock & roll history. Although he had a rising career before, he was instrumental in the beginning of Motown Records and the “Detroit Sound”.
Wilson’s powerful, electrifying live performances rarely failed to bring audiences to a state of frenzy. His live performances consisted of knee-drops, splits, spins, back-flips, one-footed across-the-floor slides, removing his tie and jacket and throwing them off the stage, and a great deal of basic boxing steps (advance and retreat shuffling, and one of his favorite routines, getting some of the less attractive women in the audience to come up to the stage and kiss him. Wilson often said:
If I get the ugliest girl in the audience to come up and kiss me, they’ll all think they can have me and keep coming back and buying my records.
“Lonely Teardrops” was written by the Detroit songwriting team who wrote Wilson’s first several hits – the duo of Tyran Carlo (the pen name of Wilson’s cousin Roquel Davis) and a pre-Motown Berry Gordy Jr., along with Gwendolyn Gordy (Berry’s sister). It was originally intended by Gordy to be recorded as a ballad. After recording it, Wilson and Brunswick Records executives felt the song lacked something. It was then given to veteran Decca Records arranger Dick Jacobs who re-arranged it into the smash hit it became. They co-wrote and produced six other songs for Wilson. At the time, Gordy was a struggling songwriter, but this song – his first Top-10 hit as a songwriter – gave him the confidence to rent a building in Detroit and start the Tamla label, which would become Motown.
The first of these hits written by the trio and which became a modest R&B success (many years later, an international smash hit) was “Reet Petite” in 1957.
Jackie Wilson gained initial fame as a member of the R&B vocal group Billy Ward and His Dominoes. Wilson went solo in 1957 and scored over 50 chart singles that spanned the genres of R&B, pop, soul, doo-wop and easy listening, including 16 R&B Top 10 hits, in which six R&B of the repertoire ranked as number ones. On the Billboard Hot 100, Wilson scored 14 top 20 pop hits, six of which reached the Top 10. Jackie Wilson was one of the more important and influential musical artists of his generation.
Wilson dropped out of high school at age 15, having been sentenced to detention in the Lansing Corrections system for juveniles twice. During his second stint in detention, Wilson learned to box and began competing in the Detroit amateur circuit at age 16. After his mother forced Jackie to quit boxing, Wilson was forced by her father to marry Freda Hood, and he became a father at age 17. It is rumoured that Wilson had fathered at least 10 other children before marrying Freda. He began working at Lee’s Sensation Club as a solo singer, then formed a group called the Falcons that included cousin Levi Stubbs, who later led the Four Tops.
The 1940s Blues singer Roy Brown was a major influence on him; and Wilson grew up listening to the Mills Brothers, the Ink Spots, Louis Jordan and Al Jolson. Jackie Wilson’s stagecraft in his live shows inspired James Brown, Michael Jackson and Elvis Presley, as well as a host of other artists that followed. Presley was so impressed with Wilson that he made it a point to meet him, and the two instantly became good friends. In a photo of the two posing together, Presley’s caption in the autograph reads “You got you a friend for life”. Wilson was sometimes called “The Black Elvis”.
After his string of early 1960’s hits, his career and sales experienced a lull. In 1966, Jackie Wilson scored the first of two big comeback singles with the established Chicago soul producer Carl Davis with “Whispers (Gettin’ Louder)” and “(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher”, ( No. 6 pop hit in 1967, became one of his final hits); followed by “I Get the Sweetest Feeling”.
A key to Jackie Wilson’s musical rebirth was Chicago soul producer Carl Davis insisting that Wilson no longer record with Brunswick’s musicians in New York; instead, he recorded with legendary Detroit musicians normally employed by Motown Records and also Davis’ own Chicago-based session players. The Detroit musicians, known as the Funk Brothers, participated on Wilson’s recordings due to their respect for Davis and Jackie Wilson.
By 1975 Wilson had continued to record singles that found success on the R&B chart, but found no significant pop chart success.
On September 29, 1975, Jackie Wilson was one of the featured acts in Dick Clark’s “Good Ol’ Rock and Roll Revue”, hosted by the Latin Casino in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. He was in the middle of singing “Lonely Teardrops” when he suffered a massive heart attack. When he collapsed on stage, audience members applauded as they initially thought it was part of the act. Clark sensed something was wrong, then ordered the musicians to stop the music. Cornell Gunter of the Coasters, who was backstage, noticed Wilson was not breathing. Gunter was able to resuscitate him and Wilson was then rushed to a nearby hospital.
Medical personnel worked to stabilize Wilson’s vital signs, but the lack of oxygen to his brain caused him to slip into a coma. He briefly recovered in early 1976, and was even able to take a few wobbly steps but slipped back into a semi-comatose state. Wilson was deemed conscious but incapacitated in early June 1976, unable to speak but aware of his surroundings. Wilson was a resident of the Medford Leas Retirement Center in Medford, New Jersey, when he was admitted into Memorial Hospital of Burlington County in Mount Holly, New Jersey, due to having trouble taking nourishment, according to Wilson’s attorney John Mulkerin.
Jackie Wilson died on January 21, 1984, at age 49 from complications of pneumonia. He was initially buried in an unmarked grave at Westlawn Cemetery near Detroit. In 1987, a fundraiser by a Detroit radio station collected enough money to purchase a headstone.
In 1999, Wilson’s original version of “Higher and Higher” and “Lonely Teardrops” were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame; “Higher and Higher” (#246) and “Lonely Teardrops” (#315) are both are on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. “Lonely Teardrops” became an across-the-board national Top 10 Pop smash (#7) and a #1 hit on the R&B charts. It is ranked as the 57th biggest U.S. hit of 1959.
In 2005, Jackie Wilson was voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame and on August 17, 2013 Jackie Wilson was inducted into the Official R&B Music Hall of Fame.
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