Off topic
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June 28, 2018
A Message From The People, Revisited By Band Of Heathens
Read moreQuincy Jones himself has endorsed it?! WTF? It sounds as if Michael Bolton produced it!The Band of Heathens have announced their remarkable new album, A Message From The People, to be released in September 2018. It entails a complete re-interpretation of Ray Charles‘ 1972 album with the same title. Their vision is okay and relevant: […]
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June 16, 2018
When Did Ray Sing His First Blues?
Read moreNothing much has been written about the publisher of Rock And Roll Roundup. All I know is his first name, Barry. He obviously had an ecclectic taste for contemporary music directed at ‘teenagers’, and he didn’t discriminate between ‘white’ rock and roll and ‘black’ (rhythm and) blues. Although most articles seem to have been produced in coordination […]
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March 7, 2018
A Peggy Lee & Ray Charles Time Capsule From 1961
Read more1. Intro;2. I Got A (Wo)Man;3. You Won’t Let Me Go;4. Just For A Thrill;5. Yes, Indeed. Peggy Lee was a huge fan of Ray Charles, who called her “Sister Peggy”. She studio-recorded some of his tunes as early as 1959. A few years later she embedded an extensive Tribute To Ray Charles in her club show. […]
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May 18, 2017
The Schiffman Index Cards On Ray Charles At The Apollo, 1957 – 1971
Read moreThe Schiffmans, owners of the Apollo Theater, kept concise and hugely interesting notes on all acts he booked and re-booked. Each index card tracked the acts through the years, listing the dates of the opening nights (many gigs were for one week), the amounts paid out, and – above all – the Schiffman family’s brutally […]
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May 4, 2017
How To Raycharlesify A Tune
Read moreRay Charles’ studio version from 1964 of A Tear Fell (single: ABC-45-10571; album: ABCS-480-4), as arranged by Sid Feller, was nice enough. But only in this live version at the Pleyel Room in Paris, in a concert on October 8, 1968, the Genius could share what he really heard in the song, showing how beautiful […]
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April 11, 2017
Ray Charles Authoring Jack Sheldon Album’s Cover Notes (1961)
Read moreIn 1961 Ray Charles was at the pinnacle of his fame. It was also the year that he was first recognized and honored with a tribute album, by the soulful trumpeteer Jack Sheldon: A Jazz Profile Of Ray Charles (released by Frank Sinatra’s Reprise Records, R-2004, July 1961). Sheldon recorded the 12 tracks over two […]
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December 18, 2016
Ray Charles And The Florida Playboys, A Short Adventure
Read moreRay Charles loved to reminisce about his earliest endeavors in country music. Shortly after his seventreenth birthday, in 1947, he landed a gig with the Florida Playboys. In Michael Lydon’s biography, Ray Charles – Man And Music, the story is that “[o]ne audition convinced the Playboys that RC could play country music with a genuine […]
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July 2, 2015
Bobby and Ray (1966)
Read moreOn May 7, 1966, Ray Charles’ company plane, the Buzzard, carried the complete troupe (1 genius, 4 Raelettes, 16 musicians, manager Joe Adams, a roadie and Ray’s personal assistant) from Los Angeles to New York. One of the cats in the back of the plane was Bobby Womack. who was hired as a guitar player […]
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August 31, 2014
Bill Cosby & Ray Charles In Reno (1969)
Read moreAd from Hayward Daily Review, 18 Dec. For the week of 18 to 24 December 1969 Bill Cosby invited Ray Charles to join him at his stint at Harrah’s in Reno. A few years later Cosby looked back on it like this: