Motown pioneer, Smokey Robinson recently brought is sultry vocals to NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert Series.
The 83 year-old opened the tiny concert with 1981’s “Being With You” accompanied by a full band. From there, he casually introduced one of his numerous hits with The Miracles, “The Tears Of A Clown,” as “one I wrote with Stevie Wonder” to the audience’s delight.
The legend then segued into two songs off of Gasms, “If We Don’t Have Each Other” and “Beside You.”
He closed his set with 1979’s “Cruisin’,” which the audience was more than happy to participate in “cruising together.”
“We’ve been looking forward to playing at Tiny Desk for a long time. We appreciate all the people who put this on. We love you. Thank you so much. Now we’re going to Cruise on outta here.”
Cruisin’” reached No. 4 on the Hot 100 chart and earned a nod for Best R&B Vocal Performance, Male at the 22nd Grammy Awards in 1980.