NICK ASHFORD DEAD

Nick Ashford, who with wife Valerie Simpson wrote such legendary Motown songs as "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" and "Reach Out and Touch Somebody's Hand," has died after a prolonged battle with throat cancer, his publicist announced. He was 70. Their songs were spun into hits by, among others, Aretha Franklin, Diana Ross, Gladys Knight, Marvin Gaye, Chaka Khan, Whitney Houston and Ashford & Simpson themselves – including the '80s hit "Solid As a Rock." Ashford and Simpson's relationship went back to 1964, when they (she a 17-year-old from the Bronx, he a 21-year-old from Michigan) met in a Harlem church and decided to write songs together. They wed 10 years later. They had their first hit in 1966, when Ray Charles recorded "Let's Go Get Stoned." Motown quickly signed them to write for Ross, Gaye and Tammi Terrell, and the relationship with that label lasted seven years. Simpson cut her two solo albums for Motown. But in 1973, said Ashford, "We felt it was time for growth, to reach out as artists." The duo moved to the Warner Bros. label and also started producing albums for others, which they found less satisfying artistically but highly lucrative, allowing them to purchase a four-story Manhattan townhouse with a staff of five, and a 14-room Westport, Conn., estate with a pool, tennis courts and a barn that doubled as a stable for horses.

In recent years, Ashford & Simpson recorded and toured sporadically, and in 1996, they opened the restaurant and live entertainment venue, Sugar Bar in New York City. They were given writing credit on Amy Winehouse’s 2007 CD Back To Black for the single "Tears Dry On Their Own". The track is based on a sample of Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell's 1967 Motown classic hit "Ain't No Mountain High Enough". They had began performing their act in small, intimate venues, such as Feinstein's at the Regency in New York and the Rrazz Room in San Francisco, and in January 2009, they released a CD and DVD of their live performances entitled The Real Thing. On June 22, 2009, they made a guest performance at a party at Tribeca Rooftop, New York, to celebrate Virgin Atlantic's Birthday party. They also made their first appearance in Tokyo, Japan in November 2009, and performed 8 shows in 4 days at Blue Note Tokyo .

Ashford died in New York on August 22, 2011, of complications from throat cancer. Besides Simpson, Ashford is survived by their two daughters, Nicole and Asia.