Stevie Wonder

Stevland Hardaway Judkins was born six weeks premature in Saginaw, Michigan, on May 13, 1950. Too much oxygen in the incubator caused retinopathy of prematurity — he was blind from infancy. His family moved to Detroit.

By age nine he was playing piano, harmonica, and drums. At eleven, he signed to Motown and became "Little Stevie Wonder.

Fingertips (1963) went to number one when he was thirteen. He was a Motown child prodigy through the 60s — My Cherie Amour, For Once in My Life, Signed Sealed Delivered. Then he turned 21 in 1971, renegotiated his contract, got artistic control, and changed popular music forever.

Music of My Mind (1972) was the self-produced statement. Talking Book (1972) had Superstition. Innervisions (1973) had Living for the City.

Fulfillingness' First Finale (1974) won Album of the Year. Songs in the Key of Life (1976) won Album of the Year AGAIN and is widely considered the greatest album of the 1970s.

Three days after Songs in the Key of Life finished recording, he nearly died in a car accident. He survived. Continued making music for five more decades.

The Wonder Woman soundtrack (1984) included I Just Called to Say I Love You — which won him the Academy Award for Best Original Song. He's 75 years old and still performing.

Talking Book (October 1972) was the commercial breakthrough. Superstition is the greatest funk song ever recorded — Stevie playing every instrument, that clavinet riff, that drum break, Jeff Beck almost getting the song before Stevie kept it for himself. You Are the Sunshine of My Life is the ballad that won the Grammy for Best Pop Vocal Performance.

I Believe (When I Fall in Love It Will Be Forever). The album went platinum and established the template: funk, soul, and pop combined by one man playing everything.

Innervisions (August 1973) is the masterpiece. Living for the City is seven minutes of urban realism — the spoken-word interlude where the main character gets arrested is still devastating fifty years later. Higher Ground has the fuzzed- out clavinet riff every funk band copied.

Don't You Worry 'Bout a Thing is the Latin-flavored hit. Golden Lady. All in Love Is Fair.

Too High. He won Album of the Year, Best Engineered Recording, and Best Pop Vocal Performance.

Songs in the Key of Life (September 1976) is the album that changed everything. Double album plus a bonus EP — 21 songs in total. Sir Duke is the Ellington tribute.

I Wish is the childhood-memory funk classic. Isn't She Lovely is the daughter-birth celebration. As is the seven-minute gospel- soul epic.

Pastime Paradise was later sampled by Coolio for Gangsta's Paradise. It debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 — the first album by an American artist to do so. Won Album of the Year.

Every serious R&B and hip-hop artist since 1976 considers it untouchable.

Hotter than July (September 1980) returned to the funk. Master Blaster (Jammin') is the Bob Marley tribute. Happy Birthday is the Martin Luther King Jr.

campaign song that helped get the holiday passed in 1983. I Ain't Gonna Stand for It. Lately.

Did I Hear You Say You Love Me. Six of the ten tracks charted.

Stevie Wonder proved that one person, playing every instrument, could make better albums than most bands. Prince followed the template. D'Angelo followed the template.

Pharrell Williams, Frank Ocean, Kendrick Lamar, Bruno Mars — every multi- instrumentalist R&B perfectionist traces back to Stevie Wonder in the Talking Book studios in 1972.

The synthesizer in R&B and pop music exists because of Stevie Wonder. He adopted the ARP 2600 and TONTO (The Original New Timbral Orchestra) when most soul musicians were still using acoustic piano. Superstition's clavinet riff is played through a wah-wah pedal.

Living for the City's bassline is a Moog synthesizer. He made electronic instruments soulful twenty years before anyone else could.

25 Grammys including four Album of the Year wins (three in consecutive eligible years — 1974, 1975, 1977 — nobody else has done this). The Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2014. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989.

The Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1983. He's one of the ten best-selling artists in American history and the most critically decorated male vocalist of the 20th century.