'The simple answer is, I was given drugs when all I needed was some rest': Motown legend Martha Reeves

In advance of her appearance at the Guinness Cork Jazz Festival, Ellie O'Byrne chats to Motown legend Martha Reeves

There’s quite the story behind how you ended up in Martha and The Vandellas. Will you share it with us?

“It wasn’t one step: several things occurred that caused me to be a Motown artist. I started singing at the age of three in my grandfather’s church.

“By 21 I had been involved with two girl groups, and I was singing as Martha Lavaille in a nightclub when I was approached by a man from a record company. It was William Stephenson, but I didn’t know who he was. He was such a good-looking man that I thought he was coming to take me away, my Prince Charming. He gave me a card and told me I had talent and to come down to Hitsville USA.

“I went there next morning: my dad said, ‘quit your job and go see about this record situation.’ It was this mansion with a hand-painted sign on it. I guess William Stephenson was writing a song, because he looked up and asked me what I was doing there. I didn’t know protocol, or that I was supposed to call up and ask for an audition.

“He asked me to stay and answer the phone; I was an artist who went to a company that didn’t have a receptionist. I had been trained in my commercial course in High School to answer phones: I could type, I had shorthand. I stayed.

“For about nine months I was recording about three or four songs a day. It was 1961 when we became Martha Reeves and The Vandellas.”

It’s interesting that your father encouraged you to quit your day-job for music. In Detroit at the time, was music seen as a potential path to wealth for young black people?

“I dreamed of being a singer and bringing money home, when I worked as a cleaner, a waitress, a telephone solicitor, a housekeeper. I kept my mind on becoming a singer and I sang every day.

“But it wasn’t so much about Black or White, or superstardom or money, it was a spiritual thing. Someone saw I had talent when I got to that house with the hand-painted sign called Hitsville USA. I immediately found a place.”

What was it like to be at the hub of such a legendary creative movement?

“The house was like a celebration: there was always someone coming in the door of the A&R department looking for work or for William Stephenson, or the piano they’d write songs on, which was in the corner. It was just a beehive of talent. I was left to decide whether to answer the phone or take a message, or sing the songs they asked me to sing, or look up dictionaries to help them find rhymes for lyrics.”

Holland-Dozier-Holland were songwriters on so many of your hits, including Nowhere To Run, Heatwave and Jimmy Mack. What were the Holland brothers, Brian and Eddie, and Lamont Dozier like to work with?

“We were the first girls to sing Holland-Dozier-Holland songs. They discovered The Supremes and started writing songs for them after us, and then it was The Four Tops and the rest is history.

“They were fantastic to work with. Eddie would give you lyrics for the lead vocals, Brian would play piano and do some back-up vocals, and so would Lamont; we’d all have a person to work with, and they always turned out to be marvellous masterpieces.”

You also recorded backing vocals on four songs with Marvin Gaye?

“We sang back-up for Marvin on a four-track machine, on one microphone hanging from the ceiling, so we were standing around him. On Stubborn Kind of Fella, you can still hear our excitement on the recording. That “doo-doo-doo-WOW” back-up part was made up right there on the spot when we saw how good-looking he was, and how serene and smooth Marvin was with his lyrics.”

Like so many performers, you had a period of your career when you suffered from addiction, and hit a low point that even resulted in a suicide attempt. In hindsight, what lay behind this troubled time in your personal history?

“The simple answer is, I was given drugs when all I needed was some rest. People do what they have to to endure, and I wasn’t aware that Valium, Lithium, Quaaludes, all those things were addictive. My first drug encounter came from a physician, and I was treated with medication when all I probably needed was say no to a tour of 94 one-nighters, which is three months of your life on a bus with other artists and a 12-piece band.

“Later, you realise your medicine is what’s truly good for you. I suggest to everyone to take care of themselves and find out where God wants them to go, and to do His will.”

This year, 60 years of Motown is being celebrated. How important a milestone is that for you?

“I want our history to remain in Detroit city because a lot of times, we can be forgotten in the entertainment industry. We’re one of the biggest success stories in record history, I think. When record sales decrease, people forget you, but we have the Motown museum in Hitsville USA. It was all as a result of Berry Gordy’s dream: he wanted to bring music to the young people of America and he made over 30 acts famous in that little house I’ve been telling you about.”

You served as a Detroit City Councillor for a term, from 2005 to 2009. Is there an achievement you’re most proud of from your political career?

“We’ve come a long way as a city and I’ve grown with it, through my music and experience as a performer. I knew there was a need for a lot of things on a domestic level. When I campaigned, we visited convalescent homes and retirement homes and a lot of those people voted for me. A lot of people put their elderly relatives in retirement homes. They were in need not just of conditions being improved in the homes, but they needed company, someone to talk to.

“Visiting the elders gave me the knowledge I needed to be a good politician because they have lessons from the past and they’re forgotten.”

You’re 78 now. Is there a special secret to how you’ve kept your unique and powerful voice as you’ve aged?

“I sing every morning when I get up. My body, spirit and mind have aged, but I haven’t: I know I’m a bird and that I’ll chirp and chirp and chirp until I fall off my limb. I’m asked a lot when I’ll retire, but I’ll sing until I die.”

Martha Reeves and The Vandellas play Cork City Hall as part of the Guinness Cork Jazz Festival on Sunday, October the 27th at 8pm. www.guinnessjazzfestival.com