Mother Dear

"Mother Dear" is a 1965 song recorded by The Supremes for the Motown label.

Written and produced by Motown's main production team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, it was an unreleased single for More Hits by The Supremes; it was canceled in favor of the single "Nothing but Heartaches", as it was considered too lightweight to follow their previous single, "Back in My Arms Again". The label decided instead to release it as a follow-up single, but when "Nothing But Heartaches" failed to make it to the Top Ten, missing it by just one position and breaking the string of number-one Supremes hits, Motown chief Berry Gordy circulated a memo around the Motown offices that read as follows:

Thus the song was canceled a final time in favor of "I Hear a Symphony."

The song was re-recorded two more times with a second version recorded in the fall of 1965; possibly to be used as the single for its planned October release and then a third version in March 1966. The 1966 version was arranged in a style different from the previous version with more danceable and upbeat tempo and arrangement. The second 1965 version was not released until 2012. The 1966 version was not released until 2000.

The song was originally recorded as 'It's All Your Fault' in February 1965, the song remained unreleased and was re-recorded as version 1 of Mother Dear having the lyrics changed and the instrumentals sped up.

Credits

• Lead vocals by Diana Ross
• Background vocals by Florence Ballard and Mary Wilson
• Instrumentation by The Funk Brothers

References

• The Complete Motown Singles Vol. 5: 1965 [CD liner notes]. New York: Hip-O Select/Motown/Universal Records.
• Ribowsky, Mark. "The Supremes: A Saga of Motown Dreams, Success, and Betrayal". New York: Da Capo Press, 2009.

External links

• Lyrics of this song at MetroLyrics