“A Tribute to Motown" at the Redstone Room -- November 22.
Friday, November 22, 9 p.m.
The Redstone Room, 129 Main Street, Davenport IA
With the November 22 concert event at Davenport's Redstone Room presented by Rocktown Entertainment Group, a host of familiar fan favorites by two iconic artists will be delivered in A Tribute to Motown, the night boasting the talents of Alphonse Franklin, offering a tribute to Smokey Robinson, and Rob Willis, crooning compositions by Bobby Womack.
An R&B and soul singer, songwriter, record producer, and former record executive, Smokey Robinson was the founder and frontman of the pioneering Motown vocal group the Miracles, for which he was also chief songwriter and producer. He led the group from its 1955 origins, when they were called The Five Chimes, until 1972, when he retired from the group to focus on his role as Motown Records vice president. Robinson returned to the music industry as a solo artist the following year, finally leaving Motown in 1999. Robinson was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987 and awarded the 2016 Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for his lifetime contributions to popular music. He is a double Hollywood Walk of Fame Inductee, as a solo artist and as a member of The Miracles, and in 2022, he was inducted into the Black Music & Entertainment Walk of Fame. In addition, Robinson received the 2019 Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement presented by Awards Council members Jimmy Page and Peter Gabriel, and last year, Rolling Stone ranked the artist at number 23 on their list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time.
Starting in the early 1950s as the lead singer of his family musical group the Valentinos and as Sam Cooke's backing guitarist, Bobby Womack's career, before his 2014 passing, spanned more than 60 years and multiple styles, including R&B, blues, doo-wop, gospel, funk, and soul. Womack was a prolific singer/songwriter who wrote and originally recorded (with his brothers who formed the Valentinos) the Rolling Stones' first U.K. number one hit "It's All Over Now" and New Birth's "I Can Understand It." As a singer, he is most notable for the hits "Lookin' for a Love," "That's the Way I Feel About Cha," "Woman's Gotta Have It," "Harry Hippie," "Across 110th Street" (memorably employed for Quentin Tarantino's Jackie Brown), and his 1980s hits "If You Think You're Lonely Now" and "I Wish He Didn't Trust Me So Much." In 2009, Womack was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and two years later, the artist received his first Grammy nomination for Best Short-Form Music Video for "Stylo," shared with Mos Def and Gorillaz.
A Tribute to Motown with Alphonse Franklin and Rob Willis mill take place at Davenport's Redstone Room on November 22, admission to the 9 p.m. concert is $30, and more information and tickets are available by calling (563)326-1333 and visiting CommonChordQC.org.
