![]() Tagged “The Genius”, Brother Ray became a giant of the pop charts, boss of the Black charts, and a lasting legend. As an aspiring teenage professional musician in Seattle, Los Angeles and Miami, Charles styled his work after the silky early jazz recordings of Nat King Cole, but it was with R&B that he broke through to the charts, with singles released on several small labels, edging towards the formula that would result in the best Ray Charles songs.Ĭharles signed to Atlantic Records in 1952, and steadily established himself as the sort of artist who was at the cutting edge, recording R&B that was more like the soul music that hadn’t been invented yet cutting blues like it was jazz and even soul that was country. Charles’ mother found him a school willing to take a poor, blind Black kid, and while there, he learned to play classical piano alongside the blues and jazz he could already deliver. It’s just as well he did, as his eyesight faded to complete blindness by the time he was seven years old. ![]() ![]() Ray Charles Robinson, known to the world as Ray Charles, was born in Albany, Georgia, on 23 September 1930, and learned to play piano at an age when most kids were in infant school. ![]()
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May 2023
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