Apollo Anniversary fills up CAAM

Today was good for me. Almost every chair was filled with people who wanted to celebrate Apollo's 75th Anniversary, as seen through the eyes of the people on stage. Cornelius Grant showed a 20 minute clip of the very first MotorTown Revue to play the Apollo. As is the custom, the unknown acts open a show. This time it was the "no-hit Supremes." They looked pretty good, but Mary, Florence and Diane didn't have the choreography to any state where they were comfortable with it and the song was certainly not memorable. It was great to see Bill Murry the comedian who was then the "voice of Motown" handling the emcee chores. The CAAM crowd laughed long and loud at Marvin Gaye, second on the bill, as he went through the gyrations of "Hitchhike," and were amazed by how tiny 11 year old Stevie Wonder was and how fluid his playing was. Cornelius, of course, was the guitar player with the Choker Campbell band, dead center, hair conked out and guitar pick in hand. When he talked about some of the people on the Apollo stage now gone forever, he was very emotional. The audience loved him as they did Tony Neuton, the bass player with Smokey Robinson, Thelma Houston and as the photo said one of the Funk Brothers during the international tour. I stitched the day together with memories of working at the Apollo, first in 1985 for the 50th Anniversary; then again for six years as the writer and episode producer for "Showtime at the Apollo," and for the "Apollo at 70: A Hot Night in Harlem." We shared some good things, funny and uplifting things and spent almost an hour taking questions. Guess nobody gets tired of old Motown memories or of the place in Harlem where "Stars are Born and Legends are Made." Doing something is rewarding, getting to relive it with an appreciative audience is sweet icing on the happiness cake. Icing all over my face, I'm Ruth Adkins Robinson.