The Stylistics are a soul music

Soul music

Soul music is a music genre originating in the United States combining elements of gospel music and rhythm and blues. According to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, soul is "music that arose out of the black experience in America through the transmutation of gospel and rhythm & blues into a form of...

 vocal group, and were one of the best-known Philadelphia soul

Philadelphia soul

Philadelphia soul, sometimes called the Philadelphia Sound or Sweet Philly, is a style of soul music characterized by funk influences and lush instrumental arrangements, often featuring sweeping strings and piercing horns. The subtle sound of a glockenspiel can often be heard in the background of...

 groups

Musical ensemble

A musical ensemble is a group of people who perform instrumental or vocal music. In classical music, trios or quartets either blend the sounds of musical instrument families or group together instruments from the same instrument family, such as string ensembles or wind ensembles...

 of the 1970s. They formed in 1968, and were composed of lead Russell Thompkins, Jr.

Russell Thompkins, Jr.

Russell Allen Thompkins, Jr. is an American soul singer. Noted for his high-pitched tenor and falsetto vocals, Thompkins is the former lead singer of the Philadelphia soul vocal group The Stylistics.-Career:...

, Herbie Murrell, Airrion Love, James Smith, and James Dunn. All of their US hits

Hit record

A hit record is a sound recording, usually in the form of a single or album, that sells a large number of copies or otherwise becomes broadly popular or well-known, through airplay, club play, inclusion in a film or stage play soundtrack, causing it to have "hit" one of the popular chart listings...

 were ballads, graced by the soaring falsetto

Falsetto

Falsetto is the vocal register occupying the frequency range just above the modal voice register and overlapping with it by approximately one octave. It is produced by the vibration of the ligamentous edges of the vocal folds, in whole or in part...

 of Russell Thompkins, Jr. and the lush productions of Thom Bell

Thom Bell

Thomas Randolph "Thom" Bell is an American songwriter and producer, best known as one of the creators of the Philadelphia style of soul music in the 1970s. He moved to Philadelphia as a child.-Biography:...

, which helped make the Stylistics one of the most successful soul groups of the first half of the 1970s." During the early 1970s, the band had twelve consecutive U.S.