A Bite of Smokey Robinson 🍪

“The Quiet Legend” who helped make Motown shine

Grace Lilly

Apr 14, 2025

Monday Bites are bite-sized musician spotlights & playlists by Grace Lilly.

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• 3 min read •

I’ve got sunshine on a cloudy day

I love that lyric. It’s one of those kinds you can almost feel on your skin. I had no idea Smokey Robinson wrote it (“My Girl” for The Temptations), along with 4,000+ other songs over the last 70 years. He has a unique talent for writing songs that are simultaneously tender, catchy, and relatable.

Like most people, I’d heard the name Smokey Robinson before but didn’t know much about him. He seems to be one of those people we all know is a big deal but have trouble articulating why — fans of The Office will remember the classic Smokey died? moment, where Pam challenges Ryan to name one more Smokey Robinson song and he can’t do it.

Known for his instantly recognizable, smooth voice, Smokey was the frontman of Motown’s first hit act, the Miracles. And as one of the chief songwriters for the label, he was a sought-after collaborator and mentor. He’s also largely responsible for Motown’s success as a whole, serving as the vice president of the label for 27 years.

“I don't ever balk at being considered a Motown person, because Motown is the greatest musical event that ever happened in the history of music.”

Writing hit after hit in the 60s, he eventually left Motown in 1972 and launched a successful solo career. In the 70s and 80s, Smokey shaped the sound of R&B, making audiences swoon with chart-topping tracks like “Cruisin’” and “Baby That’s Backatcha.”

For years, his quiet charisma has shined on stage, drawing crowds to his “deeply moving” live performances. Smokey Robinson has had a profound impact on American music and is a true living legend. So it turns out, he is a (really) big deal.

Smokey Robinson

The basics

🤝 American R&B and soul singer, songwriter, and record producer

🤝 b. 1940 (Detroit, Michigan)

🤝 A key figure of Motown

Why you should know him: Frontman of Motown’s first successful act and a hit solo artist of the 70s & 80s, Smokey Robinson is ranked by Rolling Stone as No. 23 on their list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time

If you like

✨ Stevie Wonder

✨ Frank Ocean

✨ Curtis Mayfield

✨ Steve Lacy

✨ Aretha Franklin

✨ SZA

✨ Otis Redding

Known for

🏆 His silky, smooth, tenor (high) voice and his poetic, romantic lyrics

🏆 Being the founder & frontman of the pioneering Motown vocal group the Miracles

🏆 His ability to express genuine emotion in his music, and his masterful, moving live performances

🏆 3 Grammy Awards, including the Grammy Legend Award and Lifetime Achievement Award

🏆 His Miracles song “Tracks of My Tears,” ranked by Rolling Stone as No. 50 on its list of “The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time”

🏆 Awarded the National Medal of Arts, the Kennedy Center Honors, and the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for his lifetime contributions to popular music

🏆 His style and love of fashion, his elaborate and brightly colored suits, and helping to design all of his stage outfits

Smokey’s fashion from the 60s, 70s, and today

Bite-sized facts

🍪 Born William Robinson Jr., he went by “Smokey Joe” starting at 4 years old because of his love for western movies; by 12 years old, started going by just “Smokey”

🍪 Growing up, got interested in music after hearing doo-wop and R&B groups on the radio; also lived a few houses away from Aretha Franklin and knew her since she was 5

🍪 At 15, started a doo-wop group called the Five Chimes (later the Matadors and eventually the Miracles) and at 17, met future Motown Records founder, Berry Gordy

🍪 Got his first record deal at 18 years old when the Miracles signed with Tamla Records (became Motown Records the following year); one of the first acts to sign to the newly formed label

🍪 Studied electrical engineering in college but dropped out after the Miracles released their first record

22-year-old Robinson (front left) with the Miracles in 1962

🍪 At 19, married fellow Miracles member, Claudette Rogers; had two children together, Berry (after Berry Gordy) and Tamla (after the original “Tamla” label)

🍪 Between 1960-1970, he produced 26 Top Forty hits with the Miracles; including the No. 1 hit, “The Tears of a Clown” (co-written with Stevie Wonder)

🍪 Helped make Motown a success by writing & producing hit songs for other acts on the label like the Temptations (“My Girl”), Marvin Gaye, the Four Tops, and Mary Wells

🍪 At 33, released his first solo album Smokey after a year of retirement; focusing on a more mellow, romantic soul sound

🍪 Reached the height of his solo career in the 70s and 80s with albums like A Quiet Storm (1974) and One Heartbeat (1987), which earned him a Grammy Award

🍪 Credits his French great-grandmother for his “golden green” eyes; he is also part Nigerian, Scandinavian, Portuguese, and Cherokee

🍪 Hosts the SiriusXM channel, Smokey’s Soul Town; plays R&B and soul hits from the 1950s to the early 1980s

🍪 Practices yoga and Transcendental Meditation; hasn’t eaten red meat since 1972

The Beatles ❤️ Smokey

🎙️ John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and especially George Harrison were big fans of Smokey Robinson

🎙️ In the 60s, the Miracles were a large influence on the Beatles

🎙️ They covered the Miracles’ “You Really Gotta Hold on Me” on their album With the Beatles (1960)

🎙️ To this day, Smokey credits the Beatles as one of the main reasons his music was accepted by white audiences

“The Beatles were the first white act of any stature that I ever saw in my life who came out and said, ‘Hey, man, we grew up listening to Black music and we love it, and we got a lot of our feeling from Black music.’ No white act had ever said that before, come out in public or in the press and said anything like that.”

🎙️ In the 70s, George Harrison and Smokey met in LA and became friends

🎙️ George Harrison also wrote two tribute songs to Smokey:

“Ooh Baby (You Know That I Love You)” (1975), intended as a companion piece to the Miracles’ hit “Ooo Baby Baby”
“Pure Smokey” (1976), named after Smokey’s second solo album Pure Smokey (1974)

Songs & dates

♫ 1960 The Miracles’ first hit single, “Shop Around,” becomes Motown’s first million-selling hit record; from their debut album, Hi… We’re the Miracles

♫ 1965 “Tracks of My Tears” becomes a million-selling hit and is inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, later ranked as “the Greatest Motown Song of All Time” in 2021

♫ 1979 “Cruisin’” becomes his first solo Top 10 Pop single, reaches No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100, and gets a Grammy nomination

♫ 1981 “Being with You” peaks at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 1 in the UK, becomes his most successful single to date, from the gold album Being with You

♫ 1987 Gets a Grammy Award for “Just to See Her” from One Heartbeat, which hits No. 1 on the US Billboard R&B album chart

♫ 2019 Appears on the Anderson .Paak song “Make It Better”

He said

⭐ “As a kid, this is what I wanted my life to be. Not in my wildest dreams did I ever dare to dream that it would be this.”

⭐ “When someone picks up one of my songs and records it, I'm a flattered man, it's a blessing to me.”

⭐ “The only thing you're taking out of here is your spirit and your soul, so we need to be conscious to try and develop that part of ourselves, because we're all spiritual creatures.”

⭐ “I want people to sing my songs forever.”