Stevie Wonder began 1969 working to promote his recent album “For Once In My Life”, which was still climbing the charts, having been released in early December 1968. Tamla wanted to release another single from the album to boost sales after Christmas and chose “I Don’t Know Why”, which Wonder had co-written with his mother Lula Mae Hardaway, Don Hunter and Paul Riser. For the B-side, they found a song entitled “My Cherie Amour” that Wonder had finished recording in January 1968 and which had been put to one side for twelve months. The single sold well, reaching number thirty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 Singles Chart and number sixteen on the Billboard R&B Singles Chart.
Then it became apparent that radio DJs were playing the B-side more than the A-side, so Motown came up with a plan. They re-issued the single with “My Cherie Amour” as the A-side! It made its first chart entry in May and climbed to number four on both the Billboard Hot 100 and the Billboard R&B Singles Charts by August. International sales were boosted by the release of versions of the song in Spanish and Italian.
Stevie Wonder at University of San Diego
Photo: Alcala Yearbook 1969 (Wikimedia Commons)
Stevie had written the song about a girl from his school, the Michigan School for the Blind in Lansing, in 1966, and had worked on improvements with his mentors Sylvia Moy and Hank Cosby during 1967. The rhythm tracks were recorded in Studio A in early November 1967, with strings and horns added a week or so later in Studio B, the former Golden World studio. Wonder added his vocals in January 1968. A year later it was taken off the shelf and entered the charts twice! It also gave Wonder his second top-five hit on the Official UK Pop Singles Chart.
The Motown management had by then decided to build a new album around the hit single. “My Cherie Amour” (the album) was released in August, so they didn’t waste much time. Various combinations of the Wonder, Hardaway, Moy, Hunter, Cosby team came up with five songs, including the hit single placed as the opening track. Three other Motown songwriting teams contributed a song each, and there were four covers of older, non-Motown classic hits. Hank Cosby produced the album, which sold well, reaching number thirty-four on the Billboard 200 Albums Chart, number three on the Billboard R&B Albums Chart and number seventeen on the Official UK Pop Albums Chart. The album is a good mix of romantic ballads, up-tempo fun tracks, and old classics given a new funky twist. Hidden amongst them is “Somebody Knows, Somebody Cares”, co-written by Wonder, his mother and his mentors Moy and Cosby. It opens with an excellent harmonica solo that sets the tone for the track.
To round off another excellent year for Stevie Wonder, Tamla released another single from the album in September, choosing “Yester-Me, Yester-You, Yesterday”, co-written by Bryan Wells and Ron Miller and produced by Harvey Fuqua and Johnny Bristol with arrangements by Paul Riser and bouncy backing vocals from the Andantes and the Originals. Strangely, this was another old track that Wonder had recorded two years before, following in the footsteps of Chris Clark, who had cut her version of the song in 1966. Like “My Cherie Amour” it had sat on the shelf gathering dust, until someone, maybe Cosby or Wonder himself, had decided to use it. The single was extremely popular in all the major international markets, charting in ten countries and reaching the top ten in six of them. In the USA, the song climbed to number seven on the Billboard Hot 100 Singles Chart and number five on the Billboard R&B Singles Chart. The single sold even better in the UK, reaching number two on the Official UK Pop Singles Chart, the best for Stevie Wonder so far.
