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Marvin Gaye: Smokey Robinson
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David Ritz, whose lyrics include "Sexual Healing," is the biographer of Marvin Gaye (Divided Soul, Da Capo Press), Smokey Robinson, Ray Charles, producer Jerry Wexler and Etta James. His current novel is Take It Off, Take It All Off! Ritz won a 1992 Grammy for liner notes.
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Stevie Wonder sang at the service, Smokey Robinson spoke, as did Dick Gregory (Marvin was a big fan). Gaye's mother, ex wives and three kids were there too. His mom bent over the casket and kissed Marvin's cheek. After the service, he was cremated, and his family scattered his ashes at sea.
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More than ten thousand people attended Gaye's open-casket funeral in Los Angeles, at which Stevie Wonder sang and Smokey Robinson read the Twenty-third Psalm. A longtime friend, Robinson later reflected on Gaye's legacy: "The tragic ending can only be softened by the memory of a beautiful human being. He could be full of joy sometimes, but at others, full of woe, but in the end how compassionate, how wonderful, how exciting was Marvin Gaye and his music."
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