A tribute to Linda Creed

By Diane Villano
Times Staff Writer

Oxford Circle record producer Kenny Kirby grew up in Birmingham, Ala., on the blues — Ray Charles, Lynyrd Skynyrd and Alabama, among others, but it was the sound of Philadelphia that made this Southern boy rock.
"I loved the orchestration of the music coming out of Philadelphia with the Stylistics, the Chi-Lites and the Spinners. I dreamed of playing with big black stars," Kirby said.
That sound was a force to be reckoned with in the 1970s, and Philadelphia native Linda Creed, who grew up in Mount Airy, penned many of those songs we sang and danced to. Her songbook included Betcha By Golly, Wow; Break Up to Make Up; The Greatest Love of All; Hold Me; I’m Stone In Love With You; Stop, Look, Listen (To Your Heart); and You Make Me Feel Brand New. She also wrote the theme for the ’80s television series Simon & Simon.
Creed died of breast cancer in April 1986 at age 37. Six years later, the National Academy of Popular Music inducted her into its Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Twenty years after her death, Kirby, 45, and Philly Fillet Records CEO Jack Kearton hope to "recreate the magic that was Philly International Records" — the home of many well-known soul groups back then — by producing previously unpublished Creed songs.
Four Linda Creed songs are on Welcome to My World, a CD by fledgling singer Sharon Lia, who was to have been featured at a July 26 Philly Fillet record-release party at the World Cafe Live in Philadelphia. The new Creed songs are Welcome to My World; Lucky Ones; Let’s Find Those Two People; and Love Is Feeling.
In 1988, Creed’s husband, Stephen "Eppy" Epstein, asked Kirby, an accomplished musician who has toured with the likes of Sly Stone, Charlie Gracie and Van Morrison, to catalog his wife’s unproduced material.
"The unreleased Linda Creed library is an unbelievable body of work," Kirby said. "The chords are darker, deeper and hipper."
He spent about a year assembling the collection, gathering songs in all kinds of formats — from incomplete demos to tape recordings of Creed, and even lyrics on pieces of paper in a gym bag.
Some of the best-known songs in Creed’s impressive collection were done in collaboration with Thom Bell, another Philadelphia songwriter and record producer.
"Through her music," said Kirby, "I got to know her. Linda was very modest — a hippie girl from Mount Airy. She was ‘Lyric’ to Thom Bell’s ‘Maestro’."
Kirby also came to the City of Brotherly Love to bring the same integrity and production value to the songs as Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff had brought to their highly regarded Philadelphia International label.
"They never cared about the money. It was about the music," Kirby said of the local music moguls.
According to Web sites that chronicle her contributions to music, Creed composed songs that produced more than 20 gold and platinum records for such artists as Teddy Pendergrass, Dionne Warwick, the Spinners, Johnny Mathis, Dusty Springfield and Connie Stevens, among numerous others.
Her song Greatest Love of All was a huge hit for Whitney Houston 20 years ago. It also supposedly was Creed’s favorite composition.
When Kirby approached well-known talent about the trove of unrecorded Linda Creed songs, there was interest in doing hits from the past, so he and Epstein decided to look in the direction of up-and-coming talent.
According to Kirby, they found a male singer with a brilliant voice, and Epstein poured $40,000 into recording some tracks. Tragically, the singer died of complications from AIDS before production was complete.
Then came Sharon Lia.
Kearton, the Philly Fillet Records CEO, had given Kirby a CD by the young singer, and Kirby passed it along to Epstein. The accomplished music mogul agreed to let Lia audition.
"He wanted to see the magic," Kirby said.
That’s just what he saw when she sat down at the white grand piano at the Epstein home.
"I sang Let’s Find Those Two People for Eppy," Lia recalled. "He turned to Jack with a tear in his eye. It was a song Linda wrote about them. It was their story. I can’t tell you what it meant to create this feeling in this man, this mogul. Now when I sing it, I imagine the two of them together."
After the audition, Epstein gave Lia his unequivocal support.
That endorsement meant a lot to Kirby as well, he said. "Eppy liked to close his eyes and listen to music on a Walkman, catching every nuance," Kirby said. "He listened to the final product, stood up and gave me a hug, and said, ‘Linda would have been proud.’"
Earlier this year, Epstein died in his sleep. Kirby had lost his friend and mentor.
"Eppy breathed life into my career. From the first minute, he nicknamed me ‘Cowboy’ because of my Southern accent," Kirby recalled. "He told me that he needed me to be here (to put the collection together) and was going to be our promo guy. We even had business cards made up for him. Jack (Kearton) put one in Eppy’s casket."
While Epstein’s loss is still strongly felt, a collection of his wife’s unknown songs, thanks to his association with Kirby, will live on. Bennie Sims, who had been the musical director for the Three Degrees, co-produced two of the songs with Kirby.
Lia, a singer/songwriter from Long Island, is proud to help put Linda Creed’s work before the public again.
"It’s a huge honor," she said. "I feel deeply connected. She was a songwriter; I’m a songwriter. She was a woman that died a very tragic death. I want to carry on to continue her vision." ••
For more information about Philly Fillet, check out www.phillyfilletrecords.com
For information about the Linda Creed Breast Cancer Foundation, visit www.lindacreed.org
Reporter Diane Villano can be reached at 215-354-3036 or dvillano@phillynews.com