Teddy Pendergrass". National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. June 4, 2019 . Retrieved July 3, 2019. At one stage, Pendergrass wanted the group to be renamed 'Teddy Pendergrass and the Blue Notes', as fans kept mistaking him for Melvin. Trans Woman Riding With Teddy Pendergrass Speaks Out". Entertainment Weekly . Retrieved May 8, 2023. PGN: Best job? TW: Working for Kingsley Six Modeling agency. Unfortunately, the accident happened just as my career was taking off. After that, it became impossible to work. I’d been doing impersonations at the New Forrest Lounge for a year and a half and had to leave there because the owner was trying to exploit the situation. On July 13, 1985, Teddy Pendergrass made a triumphant return to the stage at the Live Aid concert in his hometown of Philadelphia, in front of a live audience of over 99,000 and 1.5 billion TV viewers.

Pendergrass published his autobiography, Truly Blessed, with Patricia Romanowski in 1998. [21] [ failed verification] [ full citation needed] PGN: Worst performing blunder? TW: I was doing Diana Ross, singing “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough,” and I fell! As executive producer, Watson wants to create more conversations on women of color's realities in their everyday lives. With Teddy, we realised it was all about sex,” says his manager Shep Gordon at one point in new doc Teddy Pendergrass: If You Don’t Know Me. Gordon didn’t have to do a lot of market research to come that conclusion: Teddy Pendergrass oozed sex – in his music, in his stage act, in his lifestyle. He was the Godfather of Sex. His music, especially at the peak of his solo career, was very much in the groove of smooth, seductive soul, powered by a husky, passionate-yet-effortless baritone. “One guy said to me: ‘Teddy Pendergrass was an early form of Viagra,’” says Olivia Lichtenstein, the documentary’s director. “And all the guys loved Teddy because he’d get the women in the mood for them. ”

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Then 31 year old Tenika Watson's injuries were more emotional than physical. Her life after the accident suffered as a result of the publicity surrounding the crash and after she was outed as a transwoman. PGN: Happy memories? TW: The Christmas I was reunited with my family in 1962. I was 10 and had been separated from my family for a time. It was the best Christmas ever to be with them again. And when I got clean and sober. A friend of mine named Phil from the Westbury Bar took me to an AA meeting and it saved my life. I’ll be 14-years sober in June.

In case it is not evident by now, Pendergrass was something of a philanderer. His wife Karen and other partners took it as a given that when he toured, Teddy would sleep with whomever he wanted. “I’m very choosy about women,” Pendergrass told an interviewer in 1978. “I’m not about to have any lady who’s going to run me down and say I’ve got to report to her where I’m at. She has to realise that I’m a travelling entertainer, and if it’s rough on her that’s the end of that.” He fathered three children by two different women, all of whom were born in 1974. SAD news about Teddy Pendergrass, yet interesting to see which mainstream media outlets tell the full story of the Rolls Royce crash that caused his paralysis. The initial Associated Press report did not mention that his passenger was Tenika Watson, a transsexual drag performer born John Watson. PGN: Any siblings? TW: Oh yes, I’m one of eight! Well, nine actually, but my oldest sister died shortly after birth. I’m the third from the end. PGN: I read a Jet article with the headline, “Teddy’s Transsexual Passenger,” in which they call you a “confessed transsexual.” It seems like it really tilted the trajectory of your life, your modeling career, etc. TW: Tilted it? It destroyed it. I was told so by potential employers and it really made me doubt myself. It was a tough time. I had one reporter come to my house and try to force her way in the door. There were some very ugly things printed. I had to move out of the city. Which is sad because I love this city. I love the people, I love the neighborhoods … There are so many places to hide! PGN: When did you start to transition? TW: When I was 20. I don’t know why it was in my head, but I had the idea that at 20 I would be considered grown, so no one could say anything to me.She said about Pendergrass at the time. ‘I was concerned about him. I was concerned if he was really hurt. I feel about him as I do about any other human being. I thought we were both going to die.’ By 1975, Teddy Pendergrass and Harold Melvin were not getting along, and were clashing over financial issues and personality differences. Blistein, Jon (February 6, 2019). "Teddy Pendergrass Doc to Premiere on Showtime This Month". Rolling Stone . Retrieved March 13, 2019. He knew his career would never be the same but he continued to record, even reaching number 2 on the R&B charts with Joy, years after the accident. He lived more than 20 years after the accident when doctors predicted he would only live for 7.

As of 2015 there are plans to make a feature film biopic of Pendergrass's life, and Tyrese Gibson is set to star as the late singer. [24] In 2020, Essence Magazine wrote that Gibson reached out to Lee Daniels to produce the film. [25] Pendergrass quit the group in 1975, and the Blue Notes failed to recapture their success with his replacements. At the same time, I've accepted my disability and moved on with my life. I do other things. I've always wanted to know I could do it again, in spite of my disability. In the spring of 2006, Pendergrass met Joan Williams. He proposed to her after four months, and they married in a private ceremony officiated by his pastor, Alyn Waller of Enon Tabernacle Baptist Church, on Easter Sunday, March 23, 2008. [22] A formal wedding was celebrated at The Ocean Cliff Resort in Newport, Rhode Island, on September 6, 2008. As members of Enon Tabernacle Baptist Church, Joan Pendergrass set up The Enon Tabernacle Baptist Church Youth Fund in the name of Pendergrass to provide assistance and a center for Philadelphia's inner city youth. I didn’t find out Teddy was paralyzed until it got in the paper. I tried to reach out to him right after the accident. I went to the hospital where he was and there was a woman there. And she said, ‘You’re not going to see him before his son does.’ And she caused this big scene and I just left.

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PGN: First crush? TW: There was a boy named Sheldon that I liked in elementary school. [Laughs.] Bald-headed, brown-skinned and he was so mean! But I liked him! Celebrate #TransJoy by supporting My Life Is No Accident: Tenika Watson's Story, an audio-memoir that documents Tenika's journey of self-love, survival & recovery! PGN: Reading about the accident, it seems that the media didn’t know at first about you being … what terminology would you like me to use? Were you frightened? TW: No, they didn’t say anything because they didn’t know. [Laughs.] Yeah, I was scared. I thought, if anyone finds out, they’re going to lynch me! It was scary wondering if was going to get out or when. Trying to figure out how to survive or explain it. I was never given a chance to explain. The only paper that gave me a break was the [Philadelphia] Tribune.

She was asked by Faggins if there was any part of her life that she would like to change, Watson stated, ‘I wish I had been born genetically a woman instead of having to get surgery. Society won’t accept me as a woman.’ The legend of Teddy Pendergrass, who died of cancer in 2010, might be better known had it not been cruelly curtailed at both ends. His early career is obscured by the fact that he rose to fame in a band that did not carry his name: Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes. Everybody knows their biggest hits: Wake Up Everybody, If You Don’t Know Me By Now, The Love I Lost, and Don’t Leave Me This Way. But to this day, most people assume the guy who sang those tunes was Harold Melvin, but no: it was Pendergrass. Perhaps that also explains why so many of their songs were covered by other artists, most notably Thelma Houston, who refashioned Don’t Leave Me This Way into a disco smash in 1976. That same year, fed up with not getting enough of the credit or the cash, Pendergrass quit the band. TP: No. My music appeals to everybody. No, I don’t keep a running list of who listens and who doesn’t. That’s not my job. He attended Thomas Edison High School for Boys in North Philadelphia. He sang with the Edison Mastersingers. He dropped out [6] in the 11th grade to enter the music business, recording his first song "Angel with Muddy Feet". The recording, however, was not a commercial success. Pendergrass played drums for several local Philadelphia bands, eventually becoming the drummer of The Cadillacs (not the famed Harlem-based group of the same name). [7] In 1970, he was spotted by the Blue Notes' founder, Harold Melvin (1939–1997), who convinced Pendergrass to play drums in the group. [7] However, during a performance, Pendergrass began singing along, and Melvin, impressed by his vocals, made him the lead singer. [7] Before Pendergrass joined the group, the Blue Notes had struggled to find success. This all changed when they landed a recording deal with Philadelphia International Records in 1971, thus beginning Pendergrass's successful collaboration with label founders Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff. PGN: Any other hobbies? TW: I’ve always made clothes and I still make clothes for the girls every now and then, if someone has a special occasion or show coming up.Gail Mitchell "Angie Stone Duets With the Late Soul Great Teddy Pendergrass on Classic 'Love TKO': Exclusive Song Premiere", Billboard.com, July 24, 2015. The 105-minute documentary includes rarely seen original footage of Teddy’s performances as well as candid interviews with people who performed with him, close friends and family members. In 1982, charismatic soul singer Teddy Pendergrass was at the peak of his career when he slammed his Rolls Royce into a tree, leaving him paralyzed from the chest down. Though there were no other vehicles involved in the crash, there was a passenger in Pendergrass' car. In the wake of the accident, questions emerged about this mystery woman. Her name was Tenika Watson, a nightclub performer and transgender woman. TEDDY Pendergras has died. But what of Tenika Watson, a transsexual drag performer born John Watson. Anorak’s Man in LA writes: And perhaps they never, never, never REALLY knew him. At the height of his career, Teddy Pendergrass saw all hell breakloose in one night. Seeing a transgendered prostitute named Tenika Watson at a club in 1982, the singerspoke to her and was ready to leave and so was she. They got in the car and the rest is R&B history. Teddy Pendergrass Gave Tenika Watson a Ride