Thursday, May 13 2010

Happy Birthday Stevie Wonder

Stevie Wonder turns 60 today. What can be said about this man that hasn’t been said before. Maybe I actually mean what can be said about what this man means to me as an artist, a visionary, or a human being? I can’t think of any living artist that embodies the term “legendary” more than him. It’s beyond effort to try and classify him. He’s a true national treasure. He is The Grand Canyon, and Mount Rushmore. He is the Statue Of Liberty and our “amber waves of grain.” There should be a Stevie Wonder holiday. For those of you that live in New York, it’s safe to say there already is one in a sense, thanks to the incomparable DJ Spinna…

I once said in my bio that I have no desire to spin for any crowd that doesn’t lose their collective schitt to the above song. That’s as true today as when I said it. But I think that there might be no other artists that is more unifying than him. Even MJ, with the genius that was him, had his detractors because of his personal character sad to say.

I remember seeing both of these episodes when I was a kid – and in doing the math I know they must have been repeats because I wasn’t even born when these shows were aired in 1972. But they definitely are worth repeating, PBS to me, and now me to you. I used to scoff at the “Cult Of Stevie” that would be running around. “How dare you lay claim to him. He’s all mine and my connection to him is deeper yada yada yada…” But Stevie belongs to no one person, he’s a once-in-a-lifetime gift to humanity, and his very being here in our universe helps hold it together in a sense. Stevie is the living embodiment that music makes the world a better place to live in, even though Stevie is so much larger than just his music. He belongs to none of us, and to all of us. “Happy birthday Stevie, happy birthday to you, HAPPY BIRTH-DAYYYY…