Profile of Otis Williams on Famous Like Me

This Otis Williams is not to be confused with the lead singer of Otis Williams and the Charms.

Otis Williams (born Otis Miles, Jr. on October 30, 1941 in Texarkana, Texas) is an African-American second tenor/baritone singer and a soul and R&B songwriter and record producer. Williams is the leader of The Temptations, a group he founded in late 1960 as The Elgins and in which he continues to perform as the sole surviving original member.

Biography

Otis Miles, Jr. was the son of Haze Louise Williams and Otis Miles, Sr., and was primarily raised by his grandmothers in the town of Texarkana, Texas. At age 12, his mother moved him to Detroit, Michigan to live with her and his new stepfather Edgar, and he began using his mother's last name at this time.

Williams became interested in music as a teenager, and put together a number of singing groups, among them Otis Williams & the Siberians, The El Domingoes, and The Distants. The Distants had a local hit, co-written by Williams and manager/producer Johnnie Mae Matthews, called "Come On", with lead vocals by Richard Street. Future Distants recordings were not as successful, and after an offer from Berry Gordy of Motown Records, Williams and his friends Elbridge "Al" Bryant and Melvin Franklin quit The Distants. Williams, Bryant, Franklin and former Primes Eddie Kendricks and Paul Williams formed The Elgins, who signed to Motown in March 1961 as The Temptations.

The Temptations eventually became the most successful act in black music over the course of its nearly five-decade existence, over which time notable singers such as David Ruffin, Dennis Edwards, former Distant Richard Street, Damon Harris, Ron Tyson, Ali-Ollie Woodson, Theo Peoples, Ray Davis, and G.C. Cameron have all been members. In fact, the group's lineup changes were so frequent, stressful, and troublesome that Williams and Melvin Franklin promised each other they would never quit the group. Franklin remained in the group until he was physically incapable of doing so in 1994, and Williams is still in the group to this day. With Franklin's death on February 23, 1995 at the age of 53, Otis Williams is the last surviving original member of the Temptations quintet.

Williams is the co-author, with Patricia Romanowski, of Temptations, a 1988 book which served as both his autobiography/memoirs and a history of his group. In 1998, Temptations was later adapted into a NBC television miniseries, The Temptations.

Although he has served the longest tenure in The Temptations, Williams very rarely sings lead, focusing instead upon his role as the group's leader and organizer, and as the background "tenor in the middle".

Otis Williams has been married three times. He and his first wife, Josephine, had one son, Otis Lamont Williams, in 1961; he died in a construction site accident in 1983 at the age of 23.

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