Ray Charles Pictures, Biography, Profile, Facts, Discography, Filmography, more.

In his own words: "I was born with music inside me. That's the only explanation I know of," Charles said in his 1978 autobiography, "Brother Ray." "Music was one of my parts ... like my blood. It was a force already with me when I arrived on the scene. It was a necessity for me, like food or water."

Name : Ray Charles (Ray Charles Robinson)

Date of Birth : February 23, 1930

Place of Birth : Albany, GA Birth

Death : June 10, 2004

Place of Death : Beverly Hills, California, USA. (liver failure)

Ray Charles Biography

Ray Charles Robinson - he later changed his name to avoid confusion with the noted boxer - was born in 1930, in Albany, Georgia. His father was a handyman; his mother stacked boards in a sawmill. The family moved to Greenville, Florida, when Ray was an infant.

Ray Charles grew up in Greenville, Florida. At age six he started to lose his sight from glaucoma after traumatically watching watching his brother drown in the washtub his mother used for take-in laundry. At the age of seven, from 1937 to 1945 he attended the St. Augustine School for the Deaf and Blind, where he learned piano, and later clarinet and alto saxophone, compose for big bands, as well as learning to read and write music in Braile. Orphaned at fifteen, Charles struck out on his own performing in bands around Florida. In 1948 at the age of seventeen Charles took his $600 savings and moved to Seattle. There he formed the Maxim trio, a group grounded in the style of Nat "King" Cole and Charles Brown. The Maxim Trio had a major R&B hit in 1949 with "Confession Blues" on the Downbeat (later Swing Time) label. It was during this time that he first began using Heroin. Charles toured with blues artist Lowell Fulson in the early '50s, having R&B hits with "Baby Let Me Hold Your Hand" and "Kiss Me Baby" on the small Los Angeles based Swingtime Label.

In 1952 Atlantic Records purchased Charles's recording contract from Swingtime for $2500. Charles give up the Nat "King" Cole stylization and began adapting gospel music techniques to blues lyrics. He soon had a hit with "It Should Have Been Me." In 1954 he arranged and played piano on Guitar Slim's top R&B hit "The Things I Used to Do" for Specialty Records and formed his own band. In 1955 Charles had a hit in both the R&B and pop fields with his own composition "I've Got a Woman." Using top flight studio musicians Charles had hits consistently on the R&B charts through the late '50s with "A Fool for You," "Drown In My Own Tears," :Hallelujah I Love Her So," and "Lonely Avenue," The recording debut of his female backup group the Raelettes. He also became popular with jazz fans, recording two highly acclaimed records and performing a set at the 1958 Newport Jazz festival in 1959. Charles established himself as a popular recording artist and a pioneer of soul music with the release of his own top R&B/pop hit composition "What I Say."

Sensing that Atlantic was still basically an R&B organization, Charles moved to ABC-Paramount Records in late 1959. Through 1961, he had top pop hits with "Georgia On My Mind," "Hit the Road Jack," "Ruby," and "Unchain My Heart."He also recorded Genius + Soul = Jazz for Impulse (ABC's jazz subsidiary label), yielding a near smash pop/ top R&B hit with the instrumental "One Mint Julip," This album and one recorded with Betty Carter for ABC-Paramount brought him increasing popularity with jazz fans, black and white.

In 1962 Charles formed Ray Charles Enterprises, comprised of Tangerine Records, Tangerine Music, and Racer Music Company, opening studios and offices in Los Angeles in 1963. By then he was using forty piece orchestras and full vocal choruses for his recordings. With his full commercial sound, his Modern Sounds in Country and Western became phenomenally popular producing crossover smashes with "I Can't Stop Loving You," "Born to Lose," and "You Don't Know Me." Within a year volume two was released and had crossover hits "You Are My Sunshine," "Your Cheating Heart," and "Take These Chains From My Heart." On ABC Charles had major pop hits with "Busted," "That Lucky Old Sun," "Crying Time," and "Together Again."

During the 60s Charles became involved in films, appearing in the 1962 film Swinging Along, and the 1966 British film Ballad in Blue, and recording the soundtracks for The Cincinnati Kid (1965) and In the Heat of the Night (1967). By this time he was performing on the nightclub circuit, touring with his own package revue from 1969 into the '70s.

In 1973 Charles left ABC Records, retaining the rights to his ABC material and transferring his Tangerine operation to the new label Crossover. During 1976 he recorded Porgy and Bess with Cleo Laine for RCA Records. In 1977 he returned to Atlantic, moving to Columbia in the '80s and Warner Brothers in the '90s. In 1978 Dial Press published his autobiography and in 1980 appeared in The Blues Brothers movie and scored a minor country hit for his duet with Clint Eastwood, "Beers to You, from the film Any Which Way You Can. Charles had a major country hit with "Born To Love Me" in 1982 and later recorded duets with country stars on Friendship. The album yielded five country hits, including "We Didn't See a Thing" (with George Jones), "Seven Spanish Angels"( with Willie Nelson) and "Two Cats Like Us" (with Hank Williams JR,). Charles also played a major role in the recording of USA for Africa's "We Are the World" single in 1985.

1n 1989 Charles had his first major pop hit in over twenty years with with "I'll Be Good to You," featuring himself and Chaka Khan. In the '90s Charles appeared in commercials for Pepsi and was the subject of a PBS documentary.

Ray Charles continues to work about eight months a year, touring with a large orchestra. He lives in Los Angeles where he is involved with RPM International, a corporation that includes Crossover Records, the music publishing companies Tangerine and Racer Music, and RPM Studios, where he records. In 1990 Charles began recording for Warner Brothers, recording in 1993 My World with Eric Clapton, Billy Preston, Mavis Staples, and June Porter.

Charles was inducted into the Blues Foundation's Hall of Fame in 1982.Charles was also inducted into the Rock and Roll's Hall of Fame in its inaugural year 1986.

Charles died at 11:35 a.m. (2:35 p.m. ET), in Beverly Hills, California, his publicist said. The cause was of complications from liver disease.

James Brown had high praise for his fellow artist.

"We lost a genius and we lost my brother," Brown said. "You've lost a cornerstone of good, and that hurts real bad."

Singer Aretha Franklin said in a written statement, "a great soul has gone on."

"He was a fabulous man, full of humor and wit," she said. "A giant of an artist, and of course, he introduced the world to secular soul singing. Undoubtedly, the music world will miss his voice. He's the voice of a lifetime."

Ray Charles was a towering figure in pop music history. The term "genius" came from Frank Sinatra -- no slouch in the singing department himself -- and others called him "the greatest pop singer of his generation" and "a true American musical original."

Charles won 12 Grammy awards, including the best R&B recording three consecutive years ("Hit the Road Jack," "I Can't Stop Loving You" and "Busted"). His version of Hoagy Carmichael's "Georgia On My Mind" was named the Georgia state song in 1979, and he lent his gravelly voice to songs ranging from "America the Beautiful" to "Makin' Whoopee" to the 1985 all-star recording of "We Are the World."

Ray Charles Quotes

Do it right or don't do it at all. That comes from my mom. If there's something I want to do, I'm one of those people that won't be satisfied until I get it done. If I'm trying to sing something and I can't get it, I'm going to keep at it until I get where I want it.

I don't know what would have happened to me if I hadn't been able to hear.

I never wanted to be famous. I only wanted to be great.

I'm not into the money thing. You can only sleep in one bed at a time. You can only eat one meal at a time, or be in one car at a time. So I don't have to have millions of dollars to be happy. All I need are clothes on my back, a decent meal, and a little loving when I feel like it. That's the bottom line.

Love is a special word, and I use it only when I mean it. You say the word too much and it becomes cheap.

My music had roots which I'd dug up from my own childhood, musical roots buried in the darkest soil.

The fact of the matter is, you don't give up what's natural. Anything I've fantasized about, I've done.

There's nothing written in the Bible, Old or New testament, that says, ''If you believe in Me, you ain't going to have no troubles.

What makes my approach special is that I do different things. I do jazz, blues, country music and so forth. I do them all, like a good utility man.

You ask me what I'd like to do that I haven't done and I say 'Nothin'!' I haven't any mountains to climb or oceans to swim. I've been an extremely blessed individual. I'm not clamorin' for more trinkets. If I were to die tomorrow, I could say I've had a good life.

Affluence separates people. Poverty knits 'em together. You got some sugar and I don't; I borrow some of yours. Next month you might not have any flour; well, I'll give you some of mine.

I did it to myself. It wasn't society... it wasn't a pusher, it wasn't being blind or being black or being poor. It was all my doing.

I never considered myself part of rock 'n' roll. My stuff was more adult. It was more difficult for teenagers to relate to; my stuff was filled with more despair than anything you'd associate with rock 'n' roll. Since I couldn't see people dancing, I didn't write jitterbugs or twists. I wrote rhythms that moved me. My style requires pure heart singing.

Learning to read music in Braille and play by ear helped me develop a damn good memory.

Music's been around a long time, and there's going to be music long after Ray Charles is dead. I just want to make my mark, leave something musically good behind. If it's a big record, that's the frosting on the cake, but music's the main meal.