#siezure

Mary Christine Brockert, also known as Teena Marie, was born on March 5th, 1956, in Santa Monica, California. She was the daughter of a construction worker named Thomas Leslie, and home renovator, Mary Anne. She started singing early on, performing Harry Belafonte's 'Banana Boat Song' by the age of two.

At the age of eight, her parents started to send her to auditions, of where she eventually gained an acting role on 'The Beverly Hillbillies', to where she was credited as 'Tina Marie Brockert'. In the episode, she tap danced for Jed Clampett.

Teena taught herself how to play the guitar, bass, and congas, and would go on to form a semi-professional R&B band with her younger brother Anthony, and their cousin.

She grew up in a predominantly black area of Venice California, spending her teen years in the historically black enclave of Oakwood, also known as 'Venice Harlem'. She formed a strong spiritual influence with the neighborhood matriarch Berthalynn Jackson, a black woman that would later become her godmother.

In an interview, Teena stated that she had a lot of black friends, and learned a lot about black culture. "All the kids used to call me 'Off White' because I acted sort of black and I was comfortable with the black kids.". Her best friend Mickey, was a black girl, and other kids would chase Teena home calling her a 'n-word lover'.

While in high school, Teena joined the Summer Dance Production and was the female lead in the school production of the musical 'The Music Man'. She also fronted the band 'Truvair' from 1974-75, with members of her classmates.

After graduating from high school, she briefly attended Santa Monica College, then went on to sign with Motown Records. While in college she had been juggling her English Literature studies while also auditioning for various record companies.

In 1976, Teena had gained an introduction with Hal Davis, a staff producer from Motown Records. This led to an audition for a film about orphans that was being developed by the record company, but the project itself was shelved. Fortunately, label boss Berry Gordy was impressed with her singing, and decided to sign her as a solo act. Teena then went on to record unreleased material for the next few years before being discovered by fellow labelmate Rick James.

She became a protegee of Rick James, who had became a star on the label with his album 'Come Get It!'. Initially James was to produce for Diana Ross, but changed his mind to work with Marie. Initially her album name was to be 'Teena Tryson', but the name 'Teena Marie' won.

Teena released her first album with Rick James as the producer and chief songwriter, and his Stone City Band backing her musically. The album, 'Wild and Peaceful' was released in 1979. The album had her first top ten hit, 'I'm a Sucker for Your Love', which was a duet with Rick JAmes. Neither the album or its packaging had her picture on it, and many people thought that she was black during the early part of her career. It was not until 1979, when Teena appeared on Soul Train with Rick James that it was revealed she was white. She was the show's first white guest, and would appear 8 more times, more than any other white act on the show.

It was not until her second album, 'Lady T', released in 1980 that her face was shown on a record cover. The album was produced by Richard Rudolph as Rick James was unavailable at the time. That same year, she released her third LP called 'Irons in the Fire', that was handled and produced mostly by herself. This was an achievement for that time, since it was rare for a female artist to be able to have done this back then. Also in 1980, Teena appeared on the song 'Fire and Desire' with Rick James, from the album 'Street Songs'. In an interview, Teena stated that she had a fever at the time, but was able to record her vocals in one take. After the session, she was driven to a hospital.

In 1981, Teena released the album 'It Must Be Magic', which was her first gold record. Her song 'Square Biz' became one of her biggest hits, and was a signature song for the rest of her career.

In 1982, Teena got into a legal battle with Motown Records over her contract and disagreements about the release of new material. The lawsuit resulted in 'The Brockert Initiative' which made it illegal for a record company to keep an artist under contract without releasing new material for that artist. In such instances, artists are able to sign and release with another label instead of being held back by an unsupportive one. In an interview, Teena said, "It wasn't something I set out to do. I just wanted to get away from Motown and have a good life. But it helped a lot of people, like Luther Vandross and the Mary Jane Girls, and a lot of different artists, to get out of their contracts.". Marie then left Motown as the label's most successful white solo act.

In 1982, Teen was contacted by Epic Records in the fall of that year. She had expressed her dismay over her Motown contract, and was then signed to a worldwide deal with the Columbia Records subsidiary that also allowed her to establish her own publishing company, Midnight Magnet.

On September 18th, 1983, she released her fifth album, 'Robbery', a concept album. It was not as successful as the previous release of 'It Must Be Magic', but it did feature talented artists such as Patrice Rushen, Paulinho da Costa, and Steve Ferrone. The album is noted for having the song 'Cassanova Brown', which is about her relationship with Rick James. The story behind the song was that after being signed to Motown and meeting Rick James in the 70's, they began a relationship which started out professional, then progressed to a romantic one. Eventually, it lead to an engagement, which they were for a few weeks. When James' alleged infidelities came to light, Teena realised that she was the mistress. Rick James denied ever having romantic relations with Teena, but Alfie Davidson, who was once a girlfriend of James, stated that Teena and Rick were once an item, while Alfie was the girlfriend. After the breakup, the relationship waned to tumultuous, and the lyrics for the song thinly veil Teena's contempt for the situation.

In 1984, Teena released 'Starchild', which became her biggest selling album, and had her biggest hit 'Lovergirl'. It had a song in tribute to Marvin Gaye, who had been shot in 1984. She was godmother to Marvin's daughter Nona.

In 1986, she released the album 'Emerald City' another concept album. The album was controversial with her established fan base, and wasn't as successful as her other albums. The album was stylistically different from her others, puzzling fans and critics alike. The album forgoes the R&B and Funk elements of her early career, and adopts a more electronic synthesizer sound. In my personal opinion there are a few good songs from this album. I personally enjoy 'Once is Not Enough' and 'Love Me Down Easy'.

In 1988, she returned to her roots and released the album 'Naked To The World' which was critically acclaimed. The album features the famous song 'Ooo La La La', which has been sampled heavily by other artists, such as the Fu Gees, Trey Songz, and Red Man.

Unfortunately, Teena's next album was also unsuccsessful, with the release of 'Ivory' in 1990. The album was her last with Epic Records, and is considered a commercial failure. Her use of hip hop elements on some tracks once again confused fans and critics. Personally, I really enjoyed the song 'The Sugar Shack', though the ending is too long. Songs such as 'If I Were a Bell', "Just Us Two", "Mr Icecream", and "Snap Your Finger" are good. In my personal opinion, I think that people weren't too big on the random poems throughout the album.

In 1994, Teena released her tenth album 'Passion Play' on her own independant label Sarai. Since she didn't have the backing of a major label, the album had limited distribution and has been long out of print. It has become one of the most sought after items in her discography. The album is not on spotify, and copies of it on amazon go for 900+ dollars. There are cheaper copies of it on ebay, and thankfully the songs have been uploaded to youtube by the generous community.

In the 90's, Teena devoted most of her time to raising her daughter Alia Rose.

During the late 90's, she began working on a new album titled 'Black Rain'. She didn't want to release it on her label Sarai, since 'Passion Play' only had moderate sales, but she wasn't able to secure a major label deal for the album. There was a promotional version pressed, that was bootlegged among fans. The songs from this bootlegged version include:

-The Mackin Game

- I'll Take The Pressure

-Baby, I'm Your Fiend

-My Body's Hungry

-Ecstasy

-I'm On Fire

-Watcha Got 4 Me

-Black Rain

-1999

-Butterflies

-Spanish Harlem

-Blackberry Playa

-The Perfect Feeling and

-Rainbow Outro

In 2004, Teena released her eleventh album 'La Dona', after what was essentially a ten year hiatus. The album was released on Cash Money Records, and became gold certified. The album includes contributions from various artists, such as Common, Birdman, MC Lyte, and of course, Rick James. Rick appeared on the song 'I Got You', which was his last recording before his death. The album peaked at #6 on the Billboard 200, which was her highest placing entry on the chart. She performed the song, "My Body's Hungry" on the show 'The Parkers' in 2000. Songs that were bootlegged from the 'Black Rain' album would appear on this one too.

In 2006, she released the album 'Sapphire', which peaked at #3 on the US R&B Albums chart and #24 on the Billboard.

In 2009, Teena released 'Congo Square', which would be her last before her death. The album peaked at #4 on the R&B charts, and featured collaborations with multiple artists, including her daughter Rose LeBeau (Alia Rose's stage name).

In 2004, when Teena was sleeping in a hotel room, a large picture frame fell and struck her on the head. The blow caused a serious concussion that would cause momentary seizures for the rest of her life. In an interview with the associated press, she also talked about how a sub zero refrigerator fell on her, and she fell into an addiction with vicodin after the passing with Rick James.

On the afternoon of December 26th 2010, Teena was found dead at her Pasadena home by her daughter Alia. On December 30th of that year, an autopsy was performed and found no signs of apparent trauma or discernible cause of death, concluding that she died from natural causes. She had suffered a generalized tonic-clonic seizure a month before.

A memorial service was held at Forest Lawn Cemetery on January 10th 2011. People from the community attended her services, such as Stevie Wonder, Smokey Robinson, Queen Latifah, Sinbad, and Berry Gordy Jr.

Teena was cremated, with her ashes given to her family. She was 54.

Before her death, Teena had been working on more songs for a new album. Through the joint effort of her daughter Alia Rose, the album Beautiful was released on January 15th, 2013. It features artists such as Smokey Robinson, Curtis Mayfield, and even Rose LeBeau.

Her daughter Alia has dabbled in music herself, with two songs on her soundcloud, and a music video released on youtube in 2015.

Teena is quoted as having said, "Overall, my race hasn't been a problem. I'm a black artist with white skin. At the end of the day you have to sing what's in your soul.".

[SOURCES]

wikipedia

https://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/28/arts/music/28marie.html

https://www.whosampled.com/Teena-Marie/Ooo-La-La-La/sampled/

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/63339438/teena-marie

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/teena-marie-singer-and-songwriter-who-became-motown-rsquo-s-most-successful-white-female-artist-2170291.html

https://youtu.be/XhkJUpjcIwc

https://twitter.com/aliarose?lang=en