Jeffrey Bowen is an American

songwriter A songwriter is a person who creates musical compositions or writes lyrics for songs, or both. The writer of the music for a song can be called a composer, although this term tends to be used mainly in the classical music genre and film scoring. ...

and

record producer A record producer or music producer is a music creating project's overall supervisor whose responsibilities can involve a range of creative and technical leadership roles. Typically the job involves hands-on oversight of recording sessions; ensu ...

, notable for his work at both

Motown Records Motown is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. Founded by Berry Gordy, Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on January 12, 1959, it was incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau ...

and Holland-Dozier-Holland's Invictus and Hot Wax labels.

Biography

He is best known for his work with the groups

Chairmen of the Board Chairmen of the Board is an American-Canadian, Detroit, Michigan-based soul music group, who saw their greatest commercial success in the 1970s. Recording career General Johnson (1941–2010) had a hit as the lead singer of The Showmen in t ...

Commodores Commodores, often billed as The Commodores, are an American funk and Soul music, soul group. The group's most successful period was in the late 1970s and early 1980s when Lionel Richie was the co-lead singer. The members of the group met as m ...

DeBarge DeBarge was an American musical recording group composed of several members of the DeBarge family. In addition to various solo projects completed by members of the family, DeBarge was active between 1979 and 1989. The group originally consiste ...

and

the Temptations The Temptations is an American vocal group formed in Detroit, Michigan, in 1961 as The Elgins, known for their string of successful singles and albums with Motown from the 1960s to the mid-1970s. The group's work with producer Norman Whitfield ...

, and singers

Rick James James Ambrose Johnson Jr. (February 1, 1948 – August 6, 2004), better known by his stage name Rick James, was an American singer, songwriter, and record producer. Born and raised in Buffalo, New York, James began his musical career in his tee ...

and

Freda Payne Freda Charcilia Payne (born September 19, 1942Some sources give a birth year of 1945, but this appears to be an error as all sources agree that she is older than her sister Scherrie, born 1944.) is an American singer and actress. Payne is best ...

. He wrote

Marvin Gaye Marvin Pentz Gaye Jr. (; April 2, 1939 – April 1, 1984) was an American Rhythm and blues, R&B and soul singer, songwriter, musician, and record producer. He helped shape the sound of Motown in the 1960s, first as an in-house session player an ...

's song

You In Modern English, the word "''you''" is the second-person pronoun. It is grammatically plural, and was historically used only for the dative case, but in most modern dialects is used for all cases and numbers. History ''You'' comes from ...

. Bowen was first married to

Ruth Copeland Ruth Copeland (born ) is an English former singer, based in the United States since the 1960s and known for her collaborations with George Clinton and Parliament-Funkadelic. Biography Early life Copeland was born in Consett, County Durham, in ...

in the early 1970s. Bowen produced three albums for the Temptations: '' In a Mellow Mood'' (1967), ''

A Song for You "A Song for You" is a song written and originally recorded by rock singer and pianist Leon Russell for his first solo album ''Leon Russell'', which was released in 1970 on Shelter Records. A slow, pained plea for forgiveness and understandi ...

'' (1975), and '' Wings of Love'' (1976). In 1976, he requested Temptation

Dennis Edwards Dennis Edwards Jr. (February 3, 1943 – February 1, 2018) was an American soul and R&B singer who was best known as the frontman in The Temptations for Motown Records. Edwards joined the Temptations in 1968, replacing David Ruffin and sang w ...

to leave the Temptations and go solo, but however, Bowen had assigned all the leads to Edwards, and then this would make Bowen's last album with the Temptations. In 1978, Bowen met and married singer Bonnie Pointer, previously of the Pointer Sisters. He produced her 1978 and 1979 self-titled LPs for Motown (also known as the "red" and "purple" albums, respectively, because of their cover art) as well as her 1984 album ''If the Price Is Right'' for Private I Records. In July 2014, Pointer filed for divorce, which was finalized in 2016.

References

External links

* African-American songwriters American male songwriters Living people Year of birth missing (living people) American record producers Motown artists 21st-century African-American musicians {{US-songwriter-stub