Marv Tarplin | Motown guitarist, 70

Marv Tarplin, 70, the Motown guitarist and songwriter who shaped the sound of Smokey Robinson and the Miracles and was a cowriter of "The Tracks of My Tears" and other hits, died Sept. 30 at his home in Las Vegas. The cause of death had not been determined.

Mr. Tarplin had a knack for coming up with catchy riffs and melodies. He was fooling around with a calypso song he had heard Harry Belafonte sing, rearranging the chords, when he came up with the three-chord vamp that formed the backbone of the 1965 hit "The Tracks of My Tears," for which Robinson wrote some of the most poignant lines in pop music.

Mr. Tarplin wrote much of the music for several other Miracles hits, including "My Girl Has Gone," "Going to a Go-Go," and "The Love I Saw in You Was Just a Mirage." He also collaborated on several songs that Marvin Gaye recorded. Two of the songs he wrote for Gaye (with Robinson and others) reached No. 1 on the rhythm-and-blues charts in 1965: "I'll Be Doggone" and "Ain't That Peculiar."

He first came to Berry Gordy Jr.'s Motown label in the late 1950s as a guitar player for the Primettes, a teenage girl group that later became the Supremes. Robinson, who was already with the label, auditioned the group and told the singers to keep working, but he hired away Mr. Tarplin on the spot to play for the Miracles. It was the start of a five-decade collaboration.

When Robinson began his solo career in 1972, Mr. Tarplin initially stayed with the Miracles in Detroit, but he moved to Los Angeles to work with Robinson the next year. Over the next decade, he contributed music to many of Robinson's most memorable songs as a solo artist, including the hit "Cruisin' " in 1979. He continued touring with Robinson until he retired in 2008. - AP