Originally Posted by
transcript prepared by Pace,MioDolceCuore
I was with Michael for 32 years, he was a very gentle soul. He was a - ah - a real genius as far as moving his body was concerned.
As far as his voice was concerned- he had a range of 3.5 octaves. And it was all connected. He could use falsetto, or not use falsetto. [Mr. Riggs refers to so called 'registers' of the human voice that are most commonly known in males as 'chest register', 'head voice' and 'falsetto'].
And he was just a vastly intelligent person.
When we did "Thriller", Quincy Jones wanted us to work 2 hours a day, 6 days a week. And I said "Q! That's too much! 2 hours- and then he starts signing?" [meaning 2 hours of practice and then recording beginning after 2 hours of practicing] Good Lord!"
He said: "You're gonna do it! Blablabla."
And I said: "I hope I know how to do it!"
So we had to be very, very careful to keep his voice connected [i.e. not get him hoarse by singing full out in practice]- from his chest, to his head voice and not strain him, or push him too hard. Because he would stop vocalizing after two hours and hr would go right into singing songs.
Michael was very slim, but he was very strong. His muscles were like a coil spring. And although he was vegetarian who would occasionally have some meat - mostly he was a vegetarian - he had a wonderful, wonderful physique for dancing. And he stretched that physique. Everything he did.
He used his entire body. "The Moonwalk", he said, "everybody gives me credit for that. I did a long - it's called a slide - I didn't invent it."
He said "I used it and I did it longer than the people who invented it."
He was Peter Pan. That's why he called his Ranch Neverland Ranch. And when Michael and I started SLS (Speech Level Singing Children's Camp) - we started it together. And each summer I would get a big bus with a bathroom on it and then the parents and the kids would get on the bus and we would come up. Maybe a 150 to 200 people. He had bumper cars, he had a Ferris Wheel and a train that went around the whole place.
When lunchtime came we would sit under the tree by a babbling brook and 8 or 10 chefs would serve lunch to everybody there. He had a full movie theatre that sat a couple hundred people and out in front of that was candy, ice cream, chocolate - whatever it is. And he told the parents: "Don't bring any money. We have no use for your money here. This is something we want to provide the kids. You can have as much as you want in a day, just don't make yourself sick.
The parents would come just sitting there, we were there watching this 'cause I've seen so much this before and they would say: "Where have you brought us? Where is this place?"
"This is your childhood, this is what your children are experiencing, this is what you are experiencing. It's why it's something different. It was Neverland Ranch, the home of Peter Pan.
I've been teaching for 53 years and I've never met anyone like him. He just was different. We'd be in the top floor of a hotel in Liverpool and he'd say "Come quick!" And I'd come over "What? What?"
"Look at that cloud! Is that the most beautiful cloud you ever saw??"
We see clouds all the time and don't pay any attention to them. He was an amazing, amazing person. Whenever somebody was in trouble he would go to aid them.
A man, a very crazy man put his young son in a room in a motel and set fire to the room. I mean, he was crazy. And the boy was burned very badly. Eventually the father was arrested and put in jail. But when Michael read about it in the paper, he immediately got on a plane, took off and went to the hospital where the boy was. And there he was. He was all bandaged up, his head was all bandaged up and just a little area that he could talk through, a little hole around the mouth.
And he managed to say to Michael- Michael was at his bedside - "I don't know what I'm gonna do. I don't know what I can do now."
And Michael said: "Don't worry. I will take care of you for the rest of your life."
And he did.
NEW! Seth Riggs' touching memories about MICHAEL (June 25,2012)
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