CHARLES, RAY

born Sept. 23, 1930, Albany, Ga., U.S. Charles, 1988 original name Ray Charles Robinson American pianist, singer, composer, and bandleader, a leading black entertainer billed as the Genius. Charles was credited with the early development of soul music, a style based on a melding of gospel, rhythm and blues, and jazz music. When Charles was an infant his family moved to Greenville, Fla., and he began his musical career at age five on a piano in a neighbourhood caf. He began to go blind at six, possibly from glaucoma, completely losing his sight by age seven. He attended the State School for the Blind in St. Augustine, where he concentrated on musical studies, but left school at age 15 to play professionally after his mother died from cancer (his father had died when the boy was 10). Charles built a remarkable career based on the immediacy of emotion in his performances. After emerging as a blues and jazz pianist indebted to Nat King Cole's style in the late 1940s, Charles recorded the boogie-woogie classic Mess Around and the novelty song It Should've Been Me in 195253. His arrangement for Guitar Slim's The Things That I Used to Do became a blues million-seller in 1953. By 1954 Charles had created a successful combination of blues and gospel influences and signed on with Atlantic Records. He made such hit records as I've Got a Woman, Hallelujah I Love You So, and What'd I Say, which led the rhythm and blues sales charts in 1959 and was Charles's own first million-seller. Charles's rhythmic piano playing and band arranging revived the funky quality of jazz, but he also recorded in many other musical genres. He entered the pop market with the best-sellers Georgia on My Mind (1960) and Hit the Road, Jack (1961). His album Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music (1962) sold more than 1,000,000 copies, as did its single, I Can't Stop Loving You. Thereafter his music emphasized jazz standards and renditions of pop and show tunes. From 1955 Charles toured extensively in the U.S. and elsewhere with his own big band and a gospel-style female back-up quartet called The Raeletts. He also appeared on television and worked in such films as Ballad in Blue (1964) and The Blues Brothers (1980) as featured act and sound track composer. He formed his own custom recording labels, Tangerine in 1962 and Crossover Records in 1973. Among many national and international awards, he received 10 Grammy Awards for recording excellence. He published an autobiography, Brother Ray, Ray Charles' Own Story (1978), written with David Ritz.