If Motown Records was the lifeblood of American pop music for much of the 1960s and '70s, then the Funk Brothers served as its heart and soul.
"The Funk Brothers" was the nickname given to the group of 80 or so Detroit session musicians who backed Motown artists from 1959 until the company moved from Detroit to Los Angeles in 1972.
The collective performed at Hitsville U.S.A. on more than a decade of chart-topping songs.
The tracks ranged from the Temptations' "My Girl" to Smokey Robinson and the Miracles' "The Tears of a Clown" to Stevie Wonder's "Signed, Sealed, Delivered I'm Yours."
The Funk Brothers, alongside Mary Wilson of the Supremes, will open the 2008-09 UApresents season tonight at Centennial Hall.
They will back Wilson on a number of songs before moving into their own repertoire of classic Motown recordings.
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"There was such a connection with those guys," said bassist Bob Babbitt, part of the touring ensemble who played with Motown for five years. "I think that is one of the biggest reasons they had so much success. They fed off each other and liked each other so much that you could hear it in the records."
Babbitt joined Motown in 1967 and stayed until the label moved to L.A.
An accomplished session player, he already had worked with some of the Funk Brothers on projects for other labels and producers in Detroit, including Ed Wingate of Golden World Records.
It wasn't long before he got the call to sit in on an official Motown session with Wonder.
"When I first got there, I was nervous," Babbitt said. "But as soon as I opened the door and walked in, everyone I saw in that room, I knew."
From then on, Babbitt was a regular member of the Motown team, sharing bass duty with James Jamerson, one of the city's most respected players.
"James for the most part developed the style," Babbitt said. "He had the sound. I was just fortunate and blessed to be there when they got really busy. They started expanding, signing more producers, writers, artists. I never thought of him as competition."
Despite playing only for Motown in its later Detroit years, Babbitt was there for "Signed, Sealed, Delivered." His work also can be heard on "The Tears of a Clown," Edwin Starr's "War" and Marvin Gaye's "Mercy Mercy Me," from his popular and poignant album, "What's Going On." In 1999, The Guardian and Observer called it "the greatest album of the 20th century."
The Funk Brothers touring group has been riding the wave of popularity from the 2002 Paul Justman documentary "Standing in the Shadows of Motown." But the Brothers have since found new, more youthful fans who are drawn to acts in the same vein such as Jamie Lidell, Amy Winehouse, and Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings.
The band is coming to Tucson with three core members — Babbitt, Uriel Jones on drums and Eddie "Chank" Willis on guitar — and a supporting cast of Funk associates that includes drummer Spider Webb, guitarist Ray Monette and vocalists Marcia Ware, Delbert Nelson, Donna Curtin and Trenita Womack.
Many of the main Funk Brothers, including Jamerson, keyboardist Earl Van Dyke, percussionist Eddie "Bongo" Brown and bandleader Joe Hunter, are deceased.
"We were all happy just to be working and raising families," Babbitt said. "There was no way at the time we could have said everything we were doing was still going to be around 30 to 40 years down the line. It is a great feeling to be a part of something with such lasting power to it."
Preview
A Motown Celebration with the Funk Brothers and Mary Wilson
• When: 8 tonight.
• Where: Centennial Hall, 1020 E. University Blvd.
• Tickets: $27-$67 through the Centennial Hall box office, 621-3341.
