A Walk Down Memory Lane, Inspired by Frankie Beverly

Miss Higgi & Frankie Beverly

St. Maarten, Memorial Day Weekend, 1995!

Sinbad's 70's Soul Music Festival. It was the best and most soulful vacation ever! Mature Black folks, between the ages of mid 30's to maybe late 50's, from major cities around the country, heeded Sinbad's call to board private planes, fly to St. Maarten where we converged on the island for 5 solid days of funk and celebration of the 70s, in music, in dress, and in spirit! We enjoyed concerts by night and beach parties by day. 

The parties actually began aboard the planes. Music was blasting, drinks were flowing, folks were cuttin' up like families reuniting, because that's what we do. We were having a good time even before we landed. By the time we arrived, everybody knew who was going to be their vacation crew. I was living in DC at the time so I was a part of that crowd. It was great! 

In planning for the trip, I purposely reached back into my past to invite someone to join me with whom I had actually partied in the '70s. I invited my college Sistah Friend, Gilda Cooper, nee Hawkins, who I had not seen in many years. It was just an all-around reunion with music, with friends, with nostalgia, in the hot sun on a beautiful island with perfect weather, beautiful beaches, and lots, and lots of Beautiful Black people. Sheer paradise. 

I booked a lesser expensive package thinking that we were not going to stay in the room anyway. How bad could it be? Well, little did I know... When our shuttle, filled with other passengers from various planes, arrived to our respective housing locations, many of which were small hotels/motels or private homes, and this is long before Airbnb, Black folks were greeting us telling us not to let the shuttle leave because we were not going to like our rooms. LOL! We're so special... 

We didn't like our room and that shuttle wasn't about to leave us! Back then there was no cell phone to call a taxi or to flag a not yet even imagined, Uber. Those shuttles were not getting away. We piled back in and the drivers dumped us back at the host hotel where Sinbad was in the lobby doing his very best to sort this housing debacle. He had left this part of planning the event to a travel company that seemingly didn't do such a good job at vetting the housing. This festival was happening in his name. It was his brand, formerly known as his reputation, at stake and he genuinely wanted everybody to have a really great time. 

Gilda and I, who remember, had purchased one of the cheaper packages, ended up staying in the host hotel for not a dime more! It doesn't get better than that. So, we definitely were in the mix with the celebrities who were obviously staying at the same hotel. It was great! Understandably it was taking Sinbad a while to negotiate these unexpected changes for his unhappy "guests". Gilda, who was obviously still spoiled (LOL), threw a hissy fit and almost blew the deal for us. Sinbad looked at me and said you better control your friend. I told her, you need to be quiet so that we can get this room. It was crazy but we got a great room with a balcony and all (there's a balcony story to be told at another time)! I don't recall the name of the hotel. I think it was something like Maho. It got destroyed in a hurricane the next year. 

Sinbad's vision was to relive music from the '70s. Already, back then, we were missing real music. It has only gotten worse over time. We are a talented people who seem to have lost our way musically. I digress...  

All sorts of celebrities responded to Sinbad's call to help create his dream vacation for all of us. Frankie Beverly, whose death, sadly announced earlier today, triggered this walk down Memory Lane, was but one of many celebrities performing at the festival. The talent line up was incredible, and I still have the t-shirt to prove it! 

The t-shirt!

The O'Jays, Ms. Gladys, Teena Marie, EWF, Ohio Players, WAR, AWB, Confunkshun, Al Green, who folks booed because he was now Reverend Al Green and didn't want to sing his secular lyrics. He would just be quiet and let the music play and not say the words. People were wanting him off the stage. LOL! As I recall the Commodores and Stephanie Mills were there also. I might be confusing 1995 with the next year in Jamaica but were there all kinds of celebrities supporting the festival. Not everybody was performing. I remember Isaac Hayes being there and Ms. Angela Bassett groovin' with the peeps in the crowd. She hadn't exhaled yet! The celebrities were cool performing by night and hanging out with the regular folks by day. 

Everyday there was a party on a different beach. I will never forget Orient Beach. It is a clothing optional beach, meaning you don't have to take off your clothes, but you didn't have to keep them on either... Well, when we started showing up in mass numbers, little by little, white folks were getting off of that beach, which was good because we wanted their beach chairs. I think some fearful that Mandingo was going to whip it out at any minute mesmerizing their wives and daughters. LOL! There they were just chilling on the beach, they looked up and out of nowhere came all these Black people, with a DJ in tow spinning the records from big loud speakers, Black folks dancing and electric sliding in the water. Nobody took their clothes off. A few women took off their tops. There was some men in the water waving their shorts over their heads but never exposing themselves. In short, there were no Mandingo moments. LOL! It was just a great day at the beach. 

Every day was filled with absolute Black joy. Of course there was breakfast in the morning, exercise with Donna Richardson, who had not yet married Tom Joyner, who was also at this event, we then piled on buses to go to whatever was the designated beach for that day to have nothing but a party! Food grilling, music playing, a little bit of weed smoking, of course people were drinking. It was just pure adult fun, no fuss, no muss, just Black people lovin' each other. It was beautiful. 

After the beach party we would head back to the hotel and change for the concerts, which were recorded and aired on HBO at a later date. After the concert, we would hang out at the club til' some crazy hour in the morning, MAYBE get a nap, because it sure wasn't sleep, get up the next day, which was actually later the same day, and do it all over again. It was non-stop fun! I recall barely sleeping and mostly forgetting to eat. It was just a great time for everyone. Mission accomplished Sinbad. It is truly one of my fondest travel memories. 

So how did I "meet" Frankie? He was minding his business having dinner in a restaurant when I saw him. I probably screeched like a crazy fan before I said, "Oh Frankie I hate to bother you". To which he said, "Come on, sit on down" I'm sure he called me Suga', or Baby, or something like that. LOL! Of course he didn't have to ask twice, I sat on down. And then, as any silly 35-year-old star struck woman truly infatuated with this sexy man would say, I said, with glazed eyes and all 32 pearly whites on full display I'm sure, "Has anyone ever told you how sexy you are?" (something goofy like that)? Yes, I really said that. He just laughed because of course he'd heard it all his life! He was so gracious and posed for the above picture with me. I don't know where Gilda was. I was hanging out with Scarla, a woman from MD, who I met on the DC party plane. She took my picture with Frankie, with a real camera, a 35 MM. Do you remember those? There were no cell phones back then. We actually had to wait for the photo to be developed and pray that it came out good. There were no do-overs. Scarla also got a picture with Frankie Beverly that night. It was pure magic. 

Another Frankie moment occurred at some other of his concerts I attended. He threw his bottled water into the crowd, or did he hand it right to me? LOL! I kept that 1/2 bottle of water for the longest time because he had actually drunk from the bottle before he screwed the cap back on and tossed it to the crowd, I mean, tossed it to me in the crowd. I swear it is only in very recent years that I actually got rid of that bottle. Creepy right? I agree. I was just a HUGE Frankie fan. 

My first Frankie concert was high school graduation 1978, Ohio. It was a gift from my cousin Carolyn. For many years after that, rarely a summer went by that I didn't don an all-white outfit and make it my business to see Frankie perform somewhere. Not to mention, there has been many a road trip where Frankie and I performed in concert together as I drove to the sound of his music blasting from my car speakers. In later years when his voice gave out and he couldn't reach the notes, it didn't matter. Loyal fans at his still sold-out concerts, took over and sang the words for him. He was adored by us, and he loved his people. He never crossed over. I am sure many folks not of our community have no idea who he is and how deep this loss is for us. I can't believe I was not intentional about making his farewell tour. I have a CDs, records, t-shirts, pictures and great memories to sustain me. He will truly, truly be missed...