Chris Clark - A Profile

Chris Clark (Christine Elizabeth Clark) was born in Santa Cruz, CA, on 1 Feb 1946. She is a six-foot platinum blonde, blue-eyed soul singer often referred to as 'The White Negress' and was one of the first white artists to sign for Motown.

She started her career as a professional singer aged only 13 and at 16 left home, acquired a manager and was on the road singing in clubs. Some record companies were showing interest but after hearing the burgeoning Motown Sound she told her manager that she wouldn't audition for anyone else until Berry Gordy had heard her and there she spent the next eighteen years. 

Before we go on let's put one myth to bed as 45Cat lists her first single as "My Sugar Baby" under the name Connie Clark. It has been claimed for years that a Frank Wilson song "My Sugar Baby", rejected by Jobete/Motown that was recorded on Herman Griffith's South L.A. Joker label in Sep 1965, is Chris Clark. Chris herself has refuted this when asked stating that she only ever recorded for Motown. Some then say it was an opera singer Connie Haines possibly because, when asked, Chris said it was a band singer from the 40s. Connie Haines recorded one single for Motown in March 1966, a cover of Mary Wells' "What's Easy For Two Is Hard For One", and her voice sounds nothing like Connie Clark (whoever she may be) nor Chris Clark. When Frank Wilson was asked all he could recall was it was a session singer which would sound more plausible to cut a demo for Wilson to shop around labels. Incidentally, the song was recorded, but unreleased, by Frank Wilson until Goldmine Soul Supply issued it on a look-a-like Joker single in 2001. It then featured on the first "Cellarful of Motown!" compilation in 2002, so I'm not sure how GSS got their hands on it first.

Her first four singles were on the V.I.P. imprint, where many of Motown's white singers were consigned to (e.g. R. Dean Taylor, Debbie Dean, The Underdogs, The Dalton Boys, Rick, Robin & Him, The Headliners, Richard Anthony to name a few). Her second single was slated as V.I.P. 25034, her version of Frank Wilson's "Do I Love You (Indeed I Do)" which suffered the same fate and was never released. There has been much discussion about this single. It is alleged to have been pressed only as a single-sided test pressing and it is claimed that only one has been found, but the test pressing has been bootlegged and was offered up for auction by Pat Brady  after John Manship had refused to auction it. So her second, actual, single was "Love Gone Bad" (mistitled on one of two promos as "Love Gone Mad") which became her only charting single, released in Jul, charting for two weeks in Oct reaching #41 R&B and #105 Hot 100. The final single on V.I.P. was "I Want To Go Back There Again" in Feb 1966. Clark them switched to the main Motown label in Sep 1967 where she released two singles, "From Head To Toe" followed by "Whisper You Love Me Boy" in Feb 1968.

She recorded two albums for Motown, "Soul Sounds" in 1967 and "CC Rides Again on an imprint set up especially for her, Weed, which is the only release on that imprint. "Soul Sounds" has been reissued twice on CD, by Universal in 2009 with one additional track "Do Right Baby Do Right (Alternate Stereo Mix)" and prior to that in 1997 by Belgian label Marginal with an additional 8 tracks (4 from "CC Rides Again", 3 B sides and "Do I Love You (Indeed I Do)". Only one compilation seems to be available which looks like it is her complete Motown catalogue of 50 tracks including both albums, three non album singles and 25 previously unreleased tracks but curiously it doesn't include "Do I Love You (Indeed I Do)".

During the early 1970s, she was an executive with Motown's Film and Television Production Division in L.A. She co-wrote the screenplay for the 1972 movie "Lady Sings the Blues", based on the life of Billie Holiday who was played by Diana Ross, for which she earned an Academy Award (Oscar) nomination. In 1975 she was the Creative Assistant on the movie "Mahogany" and served as Head of Creative Affairs for Motown from 1981 to 1989.

Clark currently lives in Santa Rosa, CA and continues to work as a screenwriter, fine art photographer and singer.

In 2011 she released a single "Dream Or Cry" and in 2016 she recorded a song "The Ghosts of San Francisco" for a movie "When the World Came to San Francisco". The video for the song (below) won the Mixed Genre Jazz Film Award at the New York Jazz Film Festival in Nov 2016.

In Oct 2021 Chris Clark performed in the UK at Detroit A-Go-Go in Cleethorpes. Here's her account of her experience.

Sources: Soulful Detroit, Soul Source, 45Cat, Wikipedia, Chris Clark website

Album Discography

1967 - Soul Sounds [Motown #MS 664]

1969 - CC Rides Again [Weed #WS-801]

Compilations

2005 - The Motown collection [Motown #981 956-4]

Singles Discography

1965-12 - Do Right Baby Do Right / Don't Be Too Long [V.I.P #25031] 

1966-04 - Do I Love You [V.I.P #25034] 

1966-07 - Love's Gone Bad / Put Yourself In My Place [V.I.P #25038] 

1967-02 - I Want To Go Back There Again / I Love You [V.I.P. #25041]

1967-09 - From Head To Toe / The Beginning Of The End [Motown #M1114]

1968-02 - Whisper You Love Me Boy / The Beginning Of The End [Motown #M1121]

2011 - Dream Or Cry [Reel Music #PCS 72014]

2016 - The Ghosts of San Francisco

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