Grammy winner was official sixth member of Temptations
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Grammy-winning singer and Rock and Roll Hall Fame inductee Dennis Edwards, an unmistakable voice of classic Motown vocal group the Temptations, died Thursday of complications from meningitis, his family confirmed.
He would have been 75 on Saturday.
A Temptations member on and off for about two decades, Mr. Edwards, who lived in the St. Louis area with his wife, Brenda Edwards, died in Chicago. He had been in and out of hospitals since a May 2017 diagnosis, she said.
While Mr. Edwards wasn’t an original singer with the classic Temptations lineup — David Ruffin, Melvin Franklin, Eddie Kendricks, Paul Williams and Otis Williams — he was the official sixth member. It was his rough-and-tough signature voice that helped guide the Temptations through its funk-psychedelic period on classic tunes such as “Cloud Nine,” “Ball of Confusion (That’s What the World is Today),” “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone” and “I Can’t Get Next to You.” “Cloud Nine” and “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone” were Grammy-winning songs.
The Temptations were awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 2013 that Mr. Edwards received along with Otis Williams and survivors of the departed group members. The Temptations were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989.
Ronald Isley of the Isley Brothers, a longtime friend of Mr. Edwards, called him “one of the greats. He had a gift, a talent, and he really sang. There aren’t many people left with voices like his.”
Mr. Edwards, Mr. Isley and Aretha Franklin performed “A Song for You” together in 2011 in Cleveland at the 16th Annual Music Masters tribute concert honoring Ms. Franklin. It was one of Mr. Isley’s last great memories with Mr. Edwards. “We had a ball,” he says. “[Ms. Franklin] asked about him every time I talked to her.”
A number of other famous names paid tribute to Mr. Edwards, including the Rev. Jesse Jackson, Kenny Rogers, Roland Martin and the Pointer Sisters (Mr. Edwards was briefly married to Ruth Pointer in 1977).
Mr. Edwards, born in Fairfield, Ala., in 1943, moved to Detroit as a young boy and eventually joined early Motown group the Contours in the 1960s. The Contours opened for the Temptations; Mr.Edwards joined in 1968 as a replacement for his friend Mr.Ruffin.
He said his time with the Temptations was amazing but also rocky. “I never imagined I’d be one of the last ones standing, me and Otis,” he said. “We really got caught up in the times, and how the heck did I make it? Wedibbled and dabbled with alcohol and drugs. But it’s important for people to know if you change your lifestyle and wake up, there is hope.”
Mr. Williams fired Mr. Edwards in 1977, but he was in and out of the group for years to come.
While touring as Dennis Edwards & the Temptations, Mr. Edwards ran into legal problems with Mr. Williams and changed the group name to the Temptations Review.
Survivors include his wife; daughters Issa Pointer of Rhode Island, Maya Peacock of Ohio, Denise Edwards, Alison Turner and Ms. Thomas, all of St. Louis; and son Bernard Hubbard of Indiana.