Michael Jackson Research Paper

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There would be no Michael Jackson if we first do not talk about The Jackson Five. Michael Joseph Jackson was born August 29, 1958, to Katherine and Joseph Jackson in Gary, Indiana. Jackson’s parents were devoted Jehovah’s Witnesses with an enormous love for music. In 1964, Joseph decided that his sons Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, Marlon, and Michael (excluding Randy, who was only three years old) would form a musical group. He managed the group and booked them in clubs and local arenas throughout the Midwest. After being discovered by Gladys Knight during an amateur competition at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, the Jackson Five signed a recording contract with Motown Records in 1968 (Miller, K. 2013). The group moved to California and stayed at the…show more content…
That same year, the animated television show The Jackson Five debuted on Saturday mornings; it was on the air for two years. In 1972, the Jackson Five embarked on its first overseas tour, bringing Randy along as the bongo player (Cascio, F., & Liftin, H.2011). In the next two years, the Jacksons released three albums: Skywriter (1973), G.I.T.: Get It Together (1973), and Dancing Machine (1974). In 1974, the Jackson Five performed the song “Dancing Machine” on the popular rhythm-and-blues dance shows Soul Train (Miller, K. 2013).. During that performance, Jackson did a street-style dance move called the Robot and started a nationwide craze. That year, problems with Motown developed when members of the Jackson Five told Gordy that they wanted to write and produce their own music. Their request was refused and derided. Jackson and his brothers disliked the music they were forced to sing but remained with the label long enough to record two more albums. The Jackson Five left Motown in 1976 (Cascio, F., & Liftin,…show more content…
Jackson planned to devote some time that year to working on film ideas, but was diverted by a serious accident during the filming of a Pepsi commercial that left him with second-degree burns to his scalp. Jackson received a $1.5 million settlement from Pepsi and donated it to the Brotman Medical Center in Culver City, California (Miller, K. 2013). The facility named its burn center in his honor. His Bad tour broke a Guinness world record when 504,000 people attended seven sold-out shows at Wembley Stadium in London. Jackson performed 123 concerts before audiences totaling 4.4 million people, and set another Guinness world record for tour grosses, with $125 million (Cascio, F., & Liftin,

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