When was it, what song was it when you were with Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes that you knew we got it, we're going now.

The second one, the second one. The very first song that was released with Gamble and Huff was a song called "I Miss You" which we thought was just the greatest thing since chocolate candy. It was our first one. Uh, but when "If You Don't Know Me By Now" was released, the reaction to that song both from radio, uh, and from the public, and just the cross-section of people who really just migrated to that song, at that point we said, you know, this is something else. This, this is different now. This is not just having a record. This now looks like we're going to have a career - which is a real big difference.

How did that make you feel? Did you know that this was special?

Repeat that again.

Did you know that "If You Don't Know Me By Now" was special?

Yes, yes, that song was, ah, as I said 'cause Gamble and Huff had a tendency to write songs that you can relate to, from the heart, from the head, from the heart, from soul. "If You Don't Know Me By Now" was just one of those songs that, ah, I think every, everybody could relate to that was in a relationship. It was something that everybody wanted to say. It was something that I think has come up in everybody's relationship at some point or the other, ahm, but by the same token, ah, it wasn't a - that's over, it was not, see you later, it wasn't negative, it wasn't, it wasn't the end it was just something that needed to be said. And at the time, I mean I'm sure that I must have been in a relationship that I could definitely relate because it's just one of those things, it's just one of those songs. So, to me, that's what made that song so special, it just, it said something that everyone could relate to.

That was '72 or maybe '73.

You're better at it than I am, somewhere around that time. I don't want to say 'cause I don't people to really know, no, it's probably around '72, yeah, exactly.

Let me just say you are looking marvelous.

Marvelous darling, marvelous. Thank you.

That set the whole success machine in motion. You just got hotter and hotter. With all of that success why did you leave the Blue Notes?

Why? Ah, there are, ah, a lot of reasons why I left, ah. I guess but the most important reason why I left was because I felt that there was more to me, there was more that I wanted to do, there was another place I needed to get to that I didn't think I could to where I was without having to go into kind of detailed explanation about it, I just needed to go somewhere else. I needed, I was growing a lot faster than, than my counterparts, I thought. And, ah, I needed to spread my wings. I told you I was a wild horse. I was a bunking bronco. They started calling me the bear and they meant that, that, I mean I was, I was flexing my muscles, and, you know, and there, there was just a lot that had to be done and, ah, I didn't want to be contained, ahm. So I thought it best for that and for a number of other reasons that don't ___, ___ explain, will explain, felt that it was best that I leave and, ah, I did without a warning, without discussion, without any advance notice, without any money. I left. Just said, I'm not going to the next job.

I understand you took a few Blue Notes with you.

Yeah, it wasn't intentional, It wasn't intentional at all. I left. I just said, this, I've got to put a stop. One of the things that helped me to, ah, make that decision was a song that we had out at the time "Wake Up Everybody" which was a tremendous hit, tremendous. But one morning, one night after a job I started singing that song to myself and I said, you know, maybe it's time to listen to what I'm saying. So I stayed up all night, thought about it and said it's something that just has to happen I can't, I can't plan it, I'm set to do it and, ah, I gave notice that morning, the next morning and a couple of the other guys said, - well, if Ted's going I'm, I'm going, I'm not staying here and I didn't ask, didn't, as a matter of fact I left without ask, I don't know, I, I don't really remember if we left all at the same time or they decided to leave after I left. But they ultimately did leave too. As a matter of fact, pretty much the rest of the crew decided to leave as well. And, ah, we went on to do some other things.

What was it you really wanted to do?

I knew eventually where I needed to be was by myself. Going the way it was I felt that I needed to do and being able to do it the way I wanted to do it. I had no answers as to how I was going to do that. I had no anything I just know that I wasn't happy where I was. I didn't feel complete. I didn't feel like I was contributing what I needed to contribute to not only to my, my, my fans that I had begun to gather but to myself most of all, most importantly for me, ahm, so I just knew that, ah, where I needed to be was just another place, another place doing it differently. Ahm, so, as I said, in the meantime I felt as though I would work it out and get logistics together as I took advantage of the fact that the other guys had left as well. So we just formed the group again, this times things were done a bit differently than they had been done before. And they knew that that was temporary and we just went on and we worked for a little while and then I just think that's, you know, we knew that could take us any further 'cause I needed, I needed to do what I needed to do.

That can be a pretty rocky moment to go out on your own. A lot of very talented folks have not made it. You were able to continue your association with Philly International and Gamble and Huff, was that an ace in the hole for you, almost a safety net in terms of knowing you'd have the material?

Ah, I'll tell you the truth it was, ah, it was a challenge, it was all a challenge that I was more than willing to take, ah. For me being in this business it means you make sacrifices, it means you, it, for the things that you want to do you have to be willing to pay the price, you have to be willing to step to the plate in order to hit a home run and you have to be willing to fail. You have to be willing to do all of those things if you expect at any time to win. So for me it was a mountain I knew I had to climb. I was more than willing to take that challenge. I've always been willing to take challenges, I grew up taking challenges: being an only child, having a mother, no father, I've always been one who has always done things the way I thought they should be done and not, and not having to answer to anybody for it and I've always taken my own chances and I've always followed by instincts according, mother would follow, follow wit, instincts, wisdom, whatever, always followed that. And I've always relied on, ahm, feeling that I got a spirituality, you know, if it felt good, felt comfortable. And I, I got the satisfying feeling from my spirituality and I went with it. So I did the same thing, I went with it and I was willing to take that challenge.

Speaking of spirituality, I know that you have a serious background in the church. I want you to tell me about it.

Ahm, from the time I can remember my mother kept me in church. I think my first recollection of any place, being anywhere was in a church. So, goes to show you that, ah, that's how close my mother is to the creator and how close she me to the creator as well. As a matter of fact my, my very first time singing when I was two and a half, three, was in church. So, ahm, church is very, very much a part of who I am. As a matter of fact I was about 10 I started a ministry, a 10. Didn't last very long but none the less I was, I took a minute and I went around to a couple churches and spoke as a youth, as a young minister. I don't remember much about it but I do remember that it occurred and I remember it was very, very much a part of, of my being at that time. And that whole experience has continued, carried me, from that time up until today and it continues to carry me and it will carry me from now and forever. It is just a part of who I am and what makes me.

... bad luck, you've that got line, I don't remember the exact words.

The only I've got to hold onto is my God, is my God. Again, another one of those things that just. I guess I'm a pretty good storyteller and that's what happens, it is very much of that song. When you talk about bad luck and you talk about the things that create those circumstances and you talk about what it takes to overcome those circumstances and naturally to me includes, you know, a faith, a very strong faith. It should because through good times and through bad times there is one thing that relieves.

Going back to Teddy on his own. I'd like to hear from you about the ladies only concerts.

Oh come on, no. … be. Like I said before I, I take chances.

You can't say, like I said before.

Ah, I've always been one to take chances and I've always been one to, to create or follow through with instincts so that was an instinct. it was something that I thought was timely based on my observation of the direction my career was going on and what was happening as a result of my career and watching the reaction to my audiences and listening at the way people were feeding back. And it was just something that I just dreamed up. And I tell you where it happened, Los Angeles; I was at the Roxie Theater and I mentioned to my manager, at the time it was Shep Gordon, well still is Shep Gordon, Danny Marcus, ah, I said to the both of them I said, you know we ought to do a For Ladies Only concert. And it was just, I mean it came off the top of my head because it was after observing the reaction of the audience. So everybody looked at each other and said, why not? So we began planning and, and working out the details and logistics and what we should and should not do and how far we should really take this and should we make this a, a joke or should, should we make this really a serious effort to eliminate men or should it be, you know, just working out all the little details about it. And we just forged on and they asked me, - are you serious about this? Sure.

I'd like to hear in your words, how did you know that the women were so into you? Were they throwing roses on the stage?

Do you really want me to start answering these questions?

Oh absolutely, absolutely.

Ahm, I don't want her to make any of you all think that I am just so, I just know so much about me and that I think that I am so all that, that, I, I'm, she's really making me answer these questions. I say, they were observations and the observations just were, ah, I had a very good relationship, I'll just say that, with, with my audience and, and, and the people who would patronize my shows most of all were females. And, ah, they responded, I don't know how to answer this question, they, they would respond to me very, in very favorable ways. I got very, ah, I used to get very loving remarks and, and I used to get flowers on the stage and I still do and it's, it's very, very flattering. It's gone even further than that from time to time but.

Let me say this when that lacy underwear began to appear on the stage, those lacy bouquets, did it embarrass you? As a performer marketing your own image.

Well it, ah, it certainly was a, ah, it was an awakening. It was certainly a revelation. It was, ah, it became, I won't say was, it's not in the past tense, it's, it, it became, for me, ah, ahm, just, it, it was, it was, it was an awakening that let me know that I had an audience that I should work to and it, it kind of told me a little something about me, a little more about me, nothing that I thought or that I had previously created or had any intention to create. It wasn't that I thought that I was all that so I was going to go out there to try to be this, you know, a la some of these young guys now who come out intentionally to pull their shirts off and be, make themselves this image, you know, that, you know, is still questionable whether they are or they are not and they do it through it certain miracle content, you know, that, you know is more about the song than it is about person. Ahm, it was my persona. I am who I am. And when I go on stage I am just, I don't make any attempts to do anything more than just what makes me comfortable. And whoever that person is, is what people respond to. And that's, and that, who they respond to is just, just who I am so that just kind of told me that there was something that I just needed to play more to.

Your concept of romance as opposed to sex. You were pushing romance.

I think, ah, for me, and I can't speak for everybody, I think, for me, I will not be defined by the lyrics of my song. I am a man who does music. It's like clothes don't make the man, the man makes the clothes. It's, it's like that song don't make me, I make the song. So that means, I love to be in control of everything I do and everything around me. So that means, you give me a romantic lyric and I'll make the atmosphere, I will build on that. And then the song then becomes, it takes me to do the song, you know, it's, it's just a belief, it's just who I am. So, for me, I don't ever feel that it's necessary to, to say certain things. I think we can be very suggestive. I think we can allude to certain things. I don't ever think there's, it's necessary to go to certain degrees, certain extents to have to make a point. And I think for, if, if an individual feels that they have to do that in order to make the point then they need to go back and revisit the mirror and look into it again and really decide and find out who they really are 'cause, you know, if it needs, if it needs all of that then they ain't got it all that they think they do. And once the song is dead, gone, they will be someone who will not live. It, the game is over. You know what I mean, the curtain is over. In order for it to live above and beyond all of that it has to be who you are, it has to be who people feel you are not who you think you are.

That was perfect.