- Source of Wealth: Music
- Age: 79
- Birth Place: Detroit, Michigan, United States
- Height: 1.82 m (6′ 0″)
- Marital Status: Married (Frances Glandney)
- Full Name: William Robinson, Jr.
- Nationality: American
- Date of Birth: February 19, 1940
- Ethnicity: African American
- Occupation: Record Producer, Songwriter, Singer, Musician, Actor, Music Executive, Singer-Songwriter
- Education: Detroit Northern High School
- Children: 3 (Berry William Borope, Trey, Tamla Claudette)
William Robinson, Jr., who is better known as Smokey Robinson, is an R&B singer-songwriter and a record producer, with an estimated net worth of $100 million. Smokey has been a record executive as well. He was born on February 19, 1940 in the US state of Michigan.
Smokey Robinson’s music career spanned for more than 50 years. He has been associated with several genres of music, like soul, pop, R&B and adult contemporary. He has earned considerable fame and wealth from all of them and in the different roles that he has played in these long years. One of his achievements has been founding “The Miracles”, which is a popular Motown vocal group. He was the chief songwriter and producer for them and he was with them from 1955 to 1972. That’s when he decided to retire from stage because he wanted to focus on being the VP of Motown.
But music remained his first priority always, and so, he returned, this time as a solo artist just a year later. Smokey was successful again, as his solo numbers A Quiet Storm, Cruisin, Baby That’s Backatcha, Just to See Her, Being With You, and A Quiet Storm were all big successes. Robinson subsequently left Motown after it was sold off in 1988. He was included into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987 for his contributions to music over the decades, and rightly so.
When he was young, Robinson was the next-door neighbor of Diana Ross. He knows her since she was eight years of age. Robinson was teetotal once, a vegetarian and completely drug free. However this changed in his late twenties. He started using marijuana, and eventually also cocaine.