A

llee Willis, award-win-
ning songwriter and 
Detroit native, died Dec. 
24, 2019, in Los Angeles at age 
72 of cardiac arrest. 
Willis, who gained inspi-
ration from Motown for her 
own work, wrote such well-
known songs as “September” 
and “Boogie Wonderland” in 
collaboration with Earth, Wind 
& Fire; she won two Grammy 
Awards for her work on 
Beverly Hills Cop and the Tony-

nominated Broadway musical 
The Color Purple, which she 
co-wrote. She is also remem-
bered for “I’
ll be There for You,
” 
the theme song for the TV show 
Friends, and many more songs.
A graduate of Mumford 
High School, Willis returned to 
Detroit from Los Angeles more 
than 30 times in recent years 
to celebrate her hometown by 
filming 70 or so “sing-alongs” 
in different Detroit locations, 
including Temple Israel in West 

Bloomfield, with citizens and 
celebrities singing “The D,
” 
a song she wrote as the city’
s 
“unofficial, official theme song.
” 
She then threw a party at the 
Detroit Institute of Arts in 
September 2017 to debut the 
video made from all the sing-
alongs.
“I love Detroit. It’
s my favor-
ite city in the world,
” the 1965 
Mumford graduate told the JN 
in 2017.
Several times, she joined 
Detroit expats in returning to 
the city for the annual Detroit 
Homecoming event. One year, 
she was a presenting performer. 
Growing up on Sorrento 
Street in Detroit, she was known 
by her birth name, Alta. Though 
she dropped out of Hebrew 
school, her grandfather was 
an Orthodox rabbi in Detroit 
named Solomon Shulman. And, 
she said in a May 10, 2018, 
JN cover story, “I can under-
stand some things in Yiddish. 

I feel Jewish. I talk about being 
Jewish. It’
s part of who I am.
”
In that story, she also defend-
ed Detroit. “I was so sick of 
hearing what people were say-
ing about Detroit. I’
d tell them 
that’
s where I’
m from, and I’
d 
get a groan, or a ‘
That’
s so sad.
’
 
But that’
s not how I felt. I felt 
like I was descended from roy-
alty. I thought it was the most 
soulful population in the world.
”
Temple Israel was the only 
location that wasn’
t in Detroit 
proper. There, according to the 
JN story, she recorded some 
of her Jewish friends from 
Mumford singing her Detroit 
song; they included longtime 
friend Sherry (Erman) Stewart, 
Joanne (Parr) Kraft, Karen and 
David Disner, Marsha (Diem) 
Fischer and Marcy Feldman.
Stewart of Bloomfield Hills 
met Willis at Mumford when 
they were 15 or 16.
“She was always an adven-
turous, creative person, great 
in sports and up for anything,” 
Stewart recalled. “She had a 
real love for Detroit and when 
she came back to do projects, 
we would always see one 
another. She’
d keep me up to 
date on what she was doing 
… I talked to her a couple of 
weeks ago. 
“She was a people person 
with a great personality. 
People were attracted to her 
all the time. When she came 
here, she embraced the people 
she met here, even people who 
didn’
t have a connection to her 
past. I would kid her that she 
had a lot of groupies; but that 
was the way she was — a very 
inclusive person.
“I’
ll miss her,” Stewart said. 
“She was always bigger than 
life; even as a young person, 
she’
d come up with these ideas 
and, down the road, they all 
happened. As a good friend, 
I told her I felt like I’
m her 
mother with so many things to 

Allee Willis

Homegrown Songwriter

Credited Her Legacy 
to Detroit

KERI GUTEN COHEN STORY DEVELOPMENT EDITOR

 JANUARY 2 • 2020 | 39

Soul
of blessed memory

COURTESY OF ALLEE WILLIS

continued on page 40