Multifaceted R&B-Pop musician Kashif passed away from undetermined causes in his Playa del Rey, California home on Sunday, September 25. He was 59 years of age.
“We are saddened by the passing of our brother,” said Mike and Pam Stitt. “We ask for your thoughts and prayers to be with us at this time.”
Kashif Saleem sprang to success in the early 80s as a pioneer of a fresh new stripped down sound of R&B production centered around exquisitely and spaciously dispatched synthesizers and drum machine patterns. This sound produced mega club/radio hits for himself and others before he landed his greatest success at the helm of Whitney Houston’s breakthrough classic, “You Give Good Love.” Kashif parlayed his windfall of success into a career second half spent largely as an author, educator, mentor and documentary filmmaker. He wrote the book “Everything You’d Better Know About The Record Business” (a more artist driven matter of fact spin on a more technical existing industry bible), and founded Kashif University at Morningside High School in Inglewood as an integrated education and arts program. And he was in the process of working on an epic ten-part documentary “The History of R&B Music and Its Influence On World Culture” at the time of his sudden passing.
Born Michael Jones in Harlem, New York, December 26, 1956, he grew up in various Brooklyn foster care homes. Music would be his salvation from abusive treatment suffered there, starting with self-teaching himself a $3 song flute in elementary school. Attention and nurturing from his junior high school music instructor Robert Wedlaw found him laser focused on mastering many musical instruments, primarily keyboards. As a teenaged protégé, he became a member of the Disco/Funk band BT Express, arriving as a teenager on the road with them before notching electric piano/Moog synthesizer/organ/clavinet and sole songwriting credit for the song “Time Tunnel” on the band’s third LP, Energy to Burn (Columbia – 1976). He wrote “Sunshine” on Function at the Junction (1977) and contributed keyboards on Shout (1978) before striking out on his own. His first gig was working as keyboardist with Stephanie Mills which led to studio work with the likes of Nona Hendryx, Gloria Gaynor, Pleasure, Change, Fonzi Thornton, Tavares and the Four Tops. Studying Islam, Michael took the name Kashif which means “discoverer” or “explorer.”
He racked up 17 R&B charting singles in Billboard magazine between 1983 and 1990, five of them Top10 hits. Kashif received six Grammy nominations, the majority in the R&B Instrumental category.
Snatched up by Clive Davis at Arista Records, Kashif was instrumental in spinning a little known saxophonist named Kenny Gorelick (Kenny G) out of jazz group The Jeff Lorber Fusion into R&B-Jazz crossover solo success with the album, G Force. He also wrote the lead single “Easier Said Than Done” for the original lineup of Average White Band’s final LP, Cupid’s in Fashion. But it was his production of the song “You Give Good Love” for Davis’ priority artist Whitney Houston that launched the superstar into orbit with a self-titled album that sold over 17 million copies worldwide.
