(Not a duo but too significant to leave out.)
Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier and Eddie Holland wrote and produced many of the songs that are most closely identified with Motown. These include “Stop! In the Name of Love” and “You Can’t Hurry Love” (the Supremes), “Heat Wave” and “Jimmy Mack” (Martha and the Vandellas), “Reach Out I’ll Be There” and “Baby I Need Your Loving” (the Four Tops), and “Can I Get a Witness” and “How Sweet It Is to Be Loved by You” (Marvin Gaye).
Holland, Dozier and Holland inaugurated their collaboration in 1962, with the single “Dearest One,” released under Dozier’s name on the Mel-O-Dy label, a Motown subsidiary. In short order, Holland-Dozier-Holland wrote and produced the first of many hits, Martha and the Vandellas’ “Come and Get These Memories,” which went to Number Three on the R&B chart and Number 29 on the pop chart in 1963. That same year, the trio also wrote and produced Marvin Gaye’s “Can I Get a Witness,” the Marvelettes’ “Locking Up My Heart” and “Forever,” the Miracles’ “I Gotta Dance to Keep from Crying” and “Mickey’s Monkey,” and Martha and the Vandellas’ “Heat Wave” and “Quicksand.”
All of those songs preceded the trio’s record-breaking success with the Supremes. In June 1964, “Where Did Our Love Go” became the first of six consecutive Number One singles for the Supremes and Holland, Dozier and Holland.
The trio epitomized the Motown sound: a fluid, uptempo style that combined catchy lyrics with the fervor of gospel, the groove of R&B and the polish of pop. More than 50 of Motown’s most memorable songs can be attributed to Holland-Dozier-Holland. They produced hits for nearly every act on the Motown family of labels.
Then, in 1967, H-D-H, as they were familiarly called, entered into a dispute with Berry Gordy Jr. over profit-sharing and royalties. Eddie Holland had the others stage a work slowdown, and by early 1968 the trio had left the label. The founded the Invictus/Hot Wax label, where they continued their hitmaking ways with Freda Payne (“Band of Gold”), Chairman of the Board (“Give Me Just a Little More Time”) and the Honey Cones (“Want Ads”). The sound of those records – with the syncopated rhythm guitars and gospel-inflected vocal arrangements purveying catchy lyrics – was a distinctive as their Motown classics.
After Invictus/Hot Wax folded in 1973, Dozier resuscitated his performing career, and the Hollands wrote and produced for a number of artists, including the Supremes and Michael Jackson. In the Eighties, Dozier co-wrote hits with Phil Collins, Boy George and Mick Hucknall of Simply Red. In 1988, the Holland brothers founded the Holland Group production company and revived their label Music Merchant.
For a “one-time-only reunion,” the three composed the score for the musical production of The First Wives Club, based on the novel by Olivia Goldsmith and a later hit film. The musical included 22 new songs from the songwriting trio.
Holland, Dozier and Holland were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990. They were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1988. And in 2003, they were named BMI Icons at the 51st BMI Pop Awards.