THEIR PARTNERSHIP IS DEFINED BY THEIR POLARISING DUET EBONY AND IVORY, BUT PAUL AND STEVIE WONDER’S KINSHIP EXTENDS FAR BEYOND THEIR UBIQUITOUS HIT SINGLE

MARK LINDORES

Stevie Wonder: “He’s a really swinging guy, the only Beatle I’ve ever met”

© Getty Images

It was in February 1966 when the bright young things of Merseybeat and Motown met for the first time when Paul attended Little Stevie Wonder’s show at London’s Scotch of St James Club. Having been raised to be a fan by his Beatles-obsessed mother, Wonder was still only 15 years of age and travelling with a chaperone when he arrived in the city. As McCartney headed backstage to introduce himself after the show, a starstruck Stevie told reporters that he would be waxing lyrical about the meeting as part of his homework. “When I’m on tour I have to write essays about the places I visit,” Stevie told the NME. “In the essay I’ll be writing when I get back I’ll certainly include my meeting with Paul McCartney. I met him in the Scotch Of St James club. He’s a really swinging guy, the only Beatle I’ve met.”

McCartney was also suitably impressed by Stevie on both a personal level as well as by his talent and, as both acts enjoyed a meteoric rise to fame during the remainder of the decade, they stayed in each other’s orbits, bumping into each other at concerts and award shows, while McCartney even included a message to Stevie in Braille on the back cover of his 1973 album Red Rose Speedway: “We love ya, baby.” Eight years later, they would find themselves in a recording studio together for the first time.