Rosalind Ashford, original Martha and the Vandellas singer, dies at 83

Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, a founding member of Martha and the Vandellas whose high soprano runs through Dancing in the Street and Nowhere to Run, died of natural causes on Sept. 15 in Redford, Michigan, at the age of 83.

The Detroit Free Press reported the death, with the cause given as natural causes. Redford is a suburb of Detroit. No further detail about her health was disclosed. She is survived by her son, Damon Holmes, four grandchildren and a daughter-in-law.

Ashford-Holmes signed with Motown in September 1962 as one of the three women billed as Martha and the Vandellas, and she stayed in the group for seven years, through two changes in the lineup, before leaving in 1969. The Vandellas placed nearly two dozen Top 40 singles on Billboard's R&B chart. Dancing in the Street, the record that became the group's signature, reached No. 2 in 1964.

What Martha Reeves said

Martha Reeves, 85, said she was deeply saddened by the news in a tribute published by the Free Press. Reeves fronted the act and gave it her name, and she had sung alongside Ashford-Holmes since 1960, when she joined the group Ashford-Holmes had helped form in 1957.

The two women had a history of friction, and multiple sources told the Free Press that they had recently made peace.

Rosalind played an important part in the early days of Martha and the Vandellas. Her voice will forever be with us through our great recordings together, and she will be missed but never forgotten.

In later years Ashford-Holmes performed with Annette Beard, who had helped form the Del-Phis with her in 1957. The two billed themselves as The Original Vandellas, often with the lead vocalist Roschelle Laughhunn, and they appeared at times with other former members of the group. Reunions with Reeves grew rare.

The three original Vandellas did reconvene from time to time. They played a 1978 benefit concert for the actor Will Geer, toured Britain together in the mid-1980s and recorded the single Step Into My Shoes in 1989 for Ian Levine's London-based Motorcity label.

A YMCA club in 1957

Ashford was born in Detroit on Sept. 2, 1943, to John and Mary Ashford. She sang in church choirs and learned to dance at local centers as a child, then joined the glee club and mixed chorus at Wilbur Wright High School.

In 1957, by Ashford's account, her mother and sister helped her audition at a Detroit YMCA club, where Edward "Pops" Larkins recruited her, Annette Beard and Gloria Williams to form a sister act to an existing male vocal group. They called themselves the Del-Phis and sang at benefit parties, YMCA events and high school functions around the city.

Martha Reeves was not among them. She was singing with another group and did not join the Del-Phis until 1960, after which the group turned serious about music. Gloria Williams, the third singer recruited in 1957, is not listed among the three who signed to Motown as Martha and the Vandellas in September 1962, and the accounts do not say why.

The Del-Phis released I'll Let You Know on Checkmate, a Chess Records subsidiary, in 1961. A follow-up under the name the Vels, There He Is (At My Door), came out on Motown's Mel-O-Dy label in 1962 and brought no national interest either. The singers also worked behind other acts, backing Marvin Gaye on Stubborn Kind of Fellow and Hitch Hike and singing on Motown sessions for artists including Mary Wells.

Signing with Berry Gordy

Reeves, who was then working a secretarial job at Motown, recruited Ashford, Williams and Beard to back her on a demo called I'll Have to Let Him Go that had been intended for Mary Wells. Berry Gordy, the label's president, heard the record and offered Reeves and her backing singers a contract of their own. The demo became the group's first single.

The group's second single, Come and Get These Memories, one of the first hits written by Holland-Dozier-Holland, reached the top 10 of the American R&B chart after a strong reception at the Motortown Revue.

(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave followed and separated the Vandellas from labelmates such as the Supremes and the Marvelettes with a rougher, brassier sound. Reeves sang brassy alto and Beard deep contralto. Ashford took the high soprano.

Quicksand gave the group a third top 40 pop hit, and Beard then left to start a family and was replaced by Betty Kelly, formerly of the Velvelettes. With Kelly in the lineup the Vandellas cut the records they are best known for, among them Dancing in the Street, Nowhere to Run, I'm Ready for Love and Jimmy Mack.

Ashford stayed on when Kelly was replaced in 1967 by Martha's sister, Lois Reeves, then left the group herself in 1969 and was succeeded by another former Velvelette, Sandra Tilley.

She married, took the surname Holmes and went to work for the local telephone company. By the 1980s she was a computer systems specialist at Michigan Bell, The Detroit News reported. Her working life after Motown was spent largely outside the music business, in the same city where the group had been built.

Hall of Fame and a stamp

Martha and the Vandellas were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, and Ashford-Holmes entered as a member of the group. She had been out of the lineup since 1969, and had spent the years since working in Detroit.

A commemorative United States postage stamp issued in 2000 carried her image alongside Reeves and Beard, WCSX reported. In 2005 the three performed together at the Vocal Group Hall of Fame induction ceremony in Atlantic City, and again the following week in the Baltimore and Washington area.

Ashford-Holmes joined fellow Vandellas Annette Beard-Sterling and Betty Kelley in legal action against Motown over unpaid royalties, WCSX reported. Published accounts of the claim give no filing date, no venue and no outcome.

The Daily Beast reported that she was also included in the Grammy Hall of Fame and in the Library of Congress's national registry. The reports do not specify which recordings those honors cover.

Detroit service and tributes

Funeral arrangements were pending as of Sept. 17, with services expected at the James H. Cole Funeral Home on Schaefer Highway in Detroit, and no date has been announced.

Her son, Damon Holmes, told the Free Press that his mother enjoyed traveling and spending time with family and friends. Reeves is 85 and Beard is 83.

Ashford-Holmes had continued to perform occasionally with Beard and other former Vandellas, though published accounts do not say when she last appeared onstage.

Reeves ended her tribute by saying that the Motown family had gotten smaller and that her heart was heavy. She and Ashford-Holmes had sung together, on and off, since 1960.