Teena Marie….the ivory queen of soul! She was also known as Lady Tee and Vanilla Child although she was born Mary Christine Brockert on March 5, 1956. She had the music in her and as early as age two, she was already singing “The Banana Boat Song (Day-O) as made popular by Harry Belafonte and progressed to performing the songs of Motown. Did you know she appeared on “The Beverly Hillbillies” under the name Tina Marie Brockert? She had formal piano lessons then taught herself to play guitar, bass and the congas! She built on her aspirations to succeed in high school, becoming the lead female in the school’s production of “The Music Man”. A chance meeting at Motown for an acting role led to her fateful meeting with Rick James, who was there to work with Diana Ross. Once he heard Teena Marie, he dropped the Ross project and concentrated on Teena. Their first LP “Wild And Peaceful” produced a #8 R&B hit in “I’m A Sucker For Your Love” a duet with Rick. She was “Soul Train”‘s first white female to appear on the show, and she was asked to return for a total of eight times. Her second LP, “Lady T” and third LP “Irons In The Fire” were released in 1980. “Irons” contained the #2 club hit “I Need Your Lovin”. A few years later, she was locked in a dispute with Motown over her contract and release of new material. Not one to be pushed around, she filed a lawsuit and won. “The Brockert Initiative” was the result, which made it illegal for a record company to keep an individual under contract without releasing new material for that artist. Motown firmly behind her now, she signed with Epic and was allowed to run her own publishing company, At this point she was a self made woman, writing, producing and performing her own compositions. Her most successful LP, “Starchild” from 1984 contained her biggest Hot 100 hit, “Lovergirl”. The sinewy guitar driven song peaked at #4, #6 on the Hot Dance/Disco chart and #9 on the R&B charts. In 2004, while she slept, a heavy picture frame on the wall over her head fell and suffered a severe concussion that resulted in momentary seizures for the rest of her life. On December 26, 2010, her daughter found her unconscious and she died shortly after that. The subsequent autopsy was unable to pinpoint the cause of death, so it was ruled natural causes.
She was 54.
