Biography of Ray Charles. Ray Charles: Darkness Turned into Light

Ray Charles, a musician who performed compositions in the style of jazz, rhythm and blues and soul, became one of the most famous American musicians. The result of it creative activity became the release of more than seventy albums, multiple Grammy awards (13 times), as well as membership in the Hall of Fame of individual musical genres (rock and roll, jazz, country, blues).

United States contains hits by Ray Charles, and famous words, said by Frank Sinatra, call him the only genius in show business.

Ray's childhood

Born Ray Charles Robinson, he saw the world in Albany in 1930. The town was small, and the financial and social situation of Ray's family was unfavorable. A few months after his birth, the whole family had to change their place of residence: they now called the small gray area of ​​Greenville (South Florida) their home.

His father's role in the musician's life was short and insignificant, since he left when the boy and his brother George were very young. He was raised by his mother Aretha and grandmother Mary Jane Robinson.

Tragic incident

The biography of Ray Charles contains one notorious fact related to the death of his brother. This happened when the future musician was only five years old, and George was four. Having plunged headlong into a deep tub of water that stood on the street, George was unable to get out and began to choke. Seeing his brother drowning, Ray tried to save him, but he did not have enough strength to pull the child out.

The resulting shock had a profound effect on Ray. He himself assumed that it was for this reason that his vision began to deteriorate until it disappeared completely. Complete blindness occurred when he was seven years old. Later, glaucoma and its consequences were considered the probable cause of blindness.

There are rumors claiming that the musician, having achieved fame, tried to find a donor for a one-eye transplant. However, the operation was never carried out due to the opinion of doctors who considered this step pointless and risky.

Ray Charles: music training

The formation of the musician’s future career was directly influenced by a pharmacist who played the piano and lived not far from Ray’s house. The first manifestations of the boy's musical talent were already noticeable when he was three years old.

Therefore, after completely losing his sight, his mother made sure that Ray entered a specialized boarding school. It was located in St. Augustine, and here Ray Charles studied organ, piano, trombone, saxophone and clarinet. Thanks to his success in music, the boy was enrolled in the Baptist choir.

1945 was the year of Ray's mother's death, his father died two years later.

Musical career: first steps

The further biography of Ray Charles (the period after completing his studies at the boarding school) is replete with the names of numerous musical projects in which he took part. They often performed country or jazz. Greatest influence Ray's style and manner of performance were influenced by such famous jazzmen as Count Basie, Art Tatum, and Artie Shaw.

The first group of which the musician became a full member was called The Florida Playboys.

A trip to Seattle in 1947 became very significant event for seventeen year old Ray. With $600 saved up and the support of guitarist Gossady McGee, he founds and develops the MacSon Trio. To record the first compositions, Ray resorted to collaboration with the group famous performer Lowell Fulson. Ray's task was to accompany the musicians on the piano. Two years later, Ray Charles's first rhythm and blues song was released. Then several more compositions were released, which later became hits.

Musician's activities in the 50s

The new decade was marked for Ray Charles Robinson by a change of label and a shortening of his name. This measure was necessary, since a boxer with a similar name was popular at that time.

Ray's first marriage lasted only a year. Beginning in July 1951, the life together of the musician and Eileen Williams did not stand the test of time. The next time Ray joined the barque three years later, he married Della Beatrice Robinson (nee Howard). They lived together until 1977.

The biography of Ray Charles in the mid-50s is full of successful songs, written independently or in collaboration with other musicians. It is during this period that a recognizable and original unique sound is formed.

Ray Charles's songs sold millions of copies, bringing popularity to the musician himself and the styles in which he worked. Ray's repertoire included gospel songs on secular themes and blues ballads. The popularity of gospel and R&B owes much to the work of this musician, whose activities attracted a large number of new fans. There were representatives of both black and white audiences. Ray Charles, as one of the first performers in the style of rhythm and blues, is credited with the impressive spread of “black” music.

The end of the fifties brought Ray universal popularity, participation in the Newport Festival, recording large quantity hits, as well as the first Grammy Award.

Biography of Ray Charles: 60s

After receiving worldwide recognition, Ray moved to a huge mansion in Beverly Hills. As one of the few top-earning artists, he began to use his creative freedom to expand his approach to music. As a result, his works became closer to pop and mainstream styles. Despite the fact that the new compositions were strikingly different from what he had done before, Ray's music was consistently successful. The breadth and variety of the musician's repertoire has reached amazing volumes.

The song "Georgia On My Mind", which became the anthem of Ray Charles's home state, was published in the early 60s. This was followed by a significant event: the release of the album Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music. The hits included in it belong to the country genre, which, in combination with racial identity Ray became a kind of revolution.

The musician's anti-racist sentiment

Coming from the lowest social class, Ray Charles was a lifelong activist for racial equality. An excellent example of his attitude to this issue can be seen in the cancellation of a concert in Augusta in 1961 due to the fact that black and white spectators were planned to be seated separately. In addition, Ray contributed (including financially) to King's activities and openly expressed disapproval of the policies of J.F. Kennedy.

Some sources mention a twenty-year ban for Ray from entering Georgia, but in reality he simply did not plan to go there.

Ray Charles and his "monkey on his back"

This is how the musician allegorically called his addiction to heroin. Having learned what it was at age 16, he spent the next two decades dependent on the drug.

In 1961, during a search of Ray's hotel room, illegal drugs were found, but there was no trial because the procedure was violated (there was no warrant). In subsequent years, the musician was repeatedly found using drugs, and in 1965 in Boston he was arrested on charges of possession of marijuana and heroin.

Life from scratch

The decisive step after which Ray Charles said a decisive “no” to drugs was long-term treatment at a clinic in Los Angeles. This measure saved him from being in prison; the court limited himself to assigning a rather lenient sentence: one year of probation. After undergoing rehabilitation, Ray Charles did not return to use, finding inspiration and solace exclusively in music and performances.

“Ray,” a film about Ray Charles, covers the theme of the musician’s drug addiction in great detail.

Mainstream and Ray's later years

Freed from drugs, the musician acquires a new style, approaching the mainstream. A feature of this period is the absence of their own compositions in favor of fantastic performances of songs by other musicians.

With the advent of the 80s, Ray Charles expanded his range of activities: participation in the filming of the film “The Blues Brothers”, in a popular television show, as well as in Pepsi advertising.

The musician accepts invitations from organizers of charity events, works together with popular young performers and performs at the inauguration social events Ray Charles' career ended in 2004 in Los Angeles, when his last performance took place.

IN recent years Throughout his life, the musician suffered from liver cancer and severe consequences of surgery performed on his hip. Despite this, he showed up at his RPM studio every day to do his job. In one of his interviews, he noted that it doesn’t matter how long life is, what matters is how beautiful it is.

After Ray Charles died in 2004, his memory was honored with the release of a posthumous album. He has received eight Grammy awards. Later, another collection would be released, including joint compositions by Ray Charles and other performers.

As part of the memorial ceremony, many musicians and thousands of loyal fans said goodbye to Ray.

Ray Charles Robinson, American jazz and country singer, pianist, composer, one of the founders of the soul style, was born in Albany (Georgia) on September 23, 1930. The musician's name can serve as a classic example of the American dream. We can say that his whole life is inextricably linked with music.

His father, Bailey Robinson, was a mechanic, and his mother worked in a sawmill. During the height of the Great Depression, the family moved to Gainesville, Florida. When Ray was five, his younger brother drowned in the washtub his mother used to do laundry. A year later, Ray became blind. Glaucoma was cited as the cause, but the diagnosis was never properly made. He later recalled that his mother and music saved him. At the age of three, Ray began humming, imitating a tapper from a nearby cafe. He had a talent from God. At a boarding school for deaf and blind children, he simultaneously learned to read words and music using the Braille system. He played many instruments - trumpet, clarinet, organ, saxophone and piano.

After Ray was orphaned at the age of fifteen, he formed his own country band in Florida. Then in 1948 future star succumbed to a sudden impulse, and with the $600 raised he went to the other end of the continent, to Seattle, where he founded the trio Maxim. During this period, Charles began using heroin.

Having settled in Los Angeles in the late 1940s, he recorded his first record. Having signed a contract with the Atlantic record company, Charles released several records, two of which were the rhythm and blues “It Should Have Been Me” and the rock gospel “I Found a Woman” (“I Got a Woman") - hit the charts in 1954, and the singer gained fame as an innovator who transformed the melancholy genre of gospel (religious hymn) into energetic rhythm and blues. Largely thanks to Charles, “black” rock and roll emerged, which grew out of traditional blues and gospel.

In the 1950s, Charles released numerous recordings that formed the “canon” of the singer and pianist’s signature style - “Greenbacks”, “This Little Girl of Mine”, “Hallelujah, I Love Her” "("Hallelujah I Love Her So"), "What should I say" ("What`d I Say"), etc.

Realizing that the Atlantic recording studio would always give preference to R$B musicians, Ray Charles decided to change the label and in 1959 signed a contract with the ABC-Paramoumt studio. And already in the early 1960s, his main soul hits were released: “Sticks and Stones”, “Hit the Road, Jack”, “Georgia in My Soul” ( "Georgia On My Mind"), "Ruby" ("Ruby").

In 1959, the song "What'd I Say" made him a star. Some radio stations took her off the air, finding Charles' voice too erotic. Soon he was performing at Carnegie Hall and jazz festival in Newport.

It was during this period that the first significant one came to him, when he was chosen as a performer of the anthem of the American state of Georgia, written by Hodja Carmichael, a Broadway classic of the 30-60s. It would seem that the anthem does not imply anything other than a standard patriotic outpouring of feelings. But Charles, performing “Georgia on my mind,” achieves real catharsis. “Georgia on my mind” became a worldwide hit, and the name Georgia became a fashionable female name.

His expressive, cracked voice, virtuoso keyboard playing, and genuine charm as a blind performer earned him love and success among both black and white listeners even at a time when strict racial barriers existed in American show business.

In 1959, his famous “What`d I Say” was released, with which the history of “soul” began - an inimitable combination of rock, r&b, jazz and country.

Over time, the singer's genre range expanded significantly, as his repertoire included new songs from a variety of genres - from country classics to old-fashioned romantic ballads, from rock and roll to modern pop hits.

During those same golden years, Charles recorded the famous version of the Groundhogs' hit "I can't stop loving you", and a little later - his unusual and mysterious variations on the Beatles' "Eleanor Rigby" and "Yesterday". The same sincerity of sadness struck the Americans.

Ray Charles himself spoke more modestly about himself. “Music has been in the world for a very long time, and will be after me. I was just trying to leave my mark, to do something good in music.”

Ray Charles never wanted to be famous. In his opinion, fame is like a headache. But he always wanted to be great. And he became one. Frank Sinatra spoke of Charles as a genius. Elvis Presley, Stevie Wonder, Billy Joel, Mig Jagger and other popular performers considered him a teacher whose songs shaped their musical careers.

Ray has recorded 70 studio albums, numerous gold records and received 17 Grammy Awards. He himself was surprised at the number of people who gathered at his concerts far beyond America. And this was true. Everyone came to listen to the blind African-American, father of soul, brilliant pianist, composer and arranger. What is his secret? In talent, multiplied by sincerity and passion for music.

Brief biography

Raymond Charles Robinson's life has been a series of losses and victories since childhood. He was born on September 23, 1930 in the southern United States in the town of Albany, Georgia. A couple of months after his birth, the family moved to Greenville, Florida. It was here that the future singer spent his childhood.The family lived in poverty. Raising a son fell on the shoulders of his mother, a fragile and petite woman. The father disappeared at work, and later left the family altogether.

As you know, trouble does not come alone. At the age of 5, Ray began to go blind. Glaucoma developed, as a result of which the boy completely lost his sight two years later. Simultaneously with terrible disease another tragedy occurs. Ray's younger brother drowns before his eyes. Until the end of his life, he regretted that he could not save him.

Stopping seeing the world is scary. But not for Ray. Mom prepared the boy for future life. She told me how to move around the house and how to perform household chores. He washed dishes, chopped wood and did absolutely everything that a sighted person would do. The neighbors condemned my mother for such an upbringing, but Ray was grateful.

There was a cafe near their home in Greenville that often played boogie-woogie. As soon as he heard a familiar melody, the boy dropped everything and ran to a cafe, where he was taught to play the piano.

After losing his sight, his mother sent her son to St. Augustine's School for the Deaf and Blind. Here Ray continued music education in Braille. He learned the intricacies of playing the clarinet, saxophone and other instruments, and sang in a Baptist choir. Here he first encountered harsh racism: insults and fights from white students.

At the age of 15, Ray lost his mother. He could not cry, the grief was so great. After this, Charles decides to quit school and go to his mother's friend in Jacksonville. A little later he wanted independence. So he ended up in Orlando, where hunger, poverty, gambling in various cafes and drugs awaited him, addiction to which lasted 17 years.

Ray began performing with the group "The Florida Playboys", which consisted mainly of white performers. One of the members of the lineup liked the performance of the young African-American, and he was offered to replace the pianist.

The dream of having his own group haunted the future father of soul. It's time to take on new heights, as his mother bequeathed to him. Major cities he ruled it out immediately - the probability of remaining a nobody was too great. Ray asked a friend to look on the map for a city that is located on the other side of the country if you draw a straight line from Orlando. Seattle lay ahead.

In Seattle, he begins to record his own songs, adhering to the R&B direction. One of the popular compositions of that time is “Baby, let me hold your hand”, which received recognition. Everyone said he sang like Nat "King" Cole. Ray did not deny this, he honed his skills, sang, enjoying his favorite pastime. According to critics, his early songs sounded cold and less emotional. Everything changed in the 50s, when Ray made another important decision in life - to be himself. This is how soul began to appear.

Ray Charles literally merged white and black musical cultures into one. Soul included jazz, rhythm and blues, and black spirituals. Ray changed the pitch of his voice. No imitation, only his own baritone, seasoned with various moans, screams and other sounds. This made his work exceptional, memorable, alive and real.

Under Atlantic Records, Ray Charles recorded one of the most famous songs- "I Got a Woman". The plaintive vocals combined with the horn arrangement gave the composition an emotionality that still touches the heartstrings.

The pinnacle of Ray Charles's success is associated with the release of the album "What'd I Say". It combined gospel, jazz and blues. Despite the popularity of the song of the same name, it was not allowed on the radio. It was considered too sexy because of Ray's characteristic vocals. This is not prevented many performers from including the composition in their repertoire in the future.

Charles later moves to the ABC record company, where he begins to earn large fees. This is the time of the hits "Georgia On My Mind" and "Hit the Road Jack". The popularity of the singer and composer is growing, he tours and continues to immerse himself in the world of music as deeply as possible, releasing new hits.

The career decline occurs in the mid-60s. It is connected to an arrest for heroin possession. Medication-assisted rehabilitation helped avoid a prison sentence. He was given a year's probation. The drugs were over.

A genius died music world at the age of 73, on June 10, 2004, at his home in Beverly Hills, California. Liver disease worsened. After his death, several more albums were released, which received 5 Grammys. The talent of Ray Charles cannot be overestimated; one can only enjoy it and be amazed at its endless energy.

Interesting facts:

• Being blind ray rode a bicycle and a motorcycle.
• He always shaved in front of the mirror.
• Ray was married twice, although the number of women he was interested in was not limited to two. In total he had 12 children from 9 different women. Subsequently, the heirs gave him 20 grandchildren and 5 great-grandchildren.

• In 2004, Ray gave $1 million to each child.
• Charles helped Martin Luther King in the fight against racism. He sponsored the pastor's activities, sending him money from concerts. Ray did not dare to give sermons, he was afraid that he could not restrain himself and “break the woods.”
• The single "Georgia on My Mind" became the official anthem of the state of Georgia - the place where father is born soul.
• The song “What"d I Say” is pure improvisation. At one of the concerts, Ray had 10-12 minutes left that needed to be worked out. He asked the women who sang along with him to simply repeat the phrases after him - a characteristic feature church hymns. That's how I was born new hit. After the concert, people came up to him and asked where they could buy the record.
• His most famous hit in America was the song “I Can’t Stop Loving You.” It occupied the leading position for 5 weeks.
• Ray Charles became one of the few black artists to reach number one on the country's music charts.
• As he became famous, he dropped Robinson from his name to avoid confusion with boxer Ray Robinson.
• He underwent hip replacement surgery in the fall of 2003.
• Before each concert, he took a glass of gin and coffee, which gave him courage and enthusiasm.
• In the early 60s, he almost died while flying from Louisiana to Oklahoma City. Ice completely covered the plane's windshield, forcing the pilot to fly at random. After several circles in the air, through a small area on the glass, we managed to see the space around us and land the plane.
• In the early 90s he participated in the Diet Pepsi advertising campaign.

• Ray did not like to communicate with journalists and was reluctant to give autographs due to the fact that he did not see exactly what he would have to leave a signature on.
• His example and resounding success became an inspiration for other blind musicians: Ronnie Milsap and Terry Gibbs.
• Charles's records are included in the Library of Congress.
• In his hometown Albany opened Ray Charles Plaza in 2007 with a round rotating pedestal containing a bronze sculpture of the famous performer at the piano.
• One of Ray's hobbies was chess.
• He was the first to combine rhythm and blues with black church singing.
• Pictured on postage stamps USA, a series dedicated to musical idols.
• Ray Charles received his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on December 16, 1981.
• Ray was ranked second in a Rolling Stone magazine poll. greatest singer of his era. The survey was conducted in 2008.

• He performed at the inauguration of President Ronald Reagan in 1985. This caused a flurry of discontent and is associated with differences in political beliefs. Ray was considered a Democrat and Reagan was considered a Republican. According to the musician's agent, he was simply making money. The fee for the performance was 100 thousand dollars.
• He also performed at Bill Clinton's first inauguration in 1993.
• At one of the concerts in Southern France, a young man climbed onto the stage and began to perform “Mess around”. What did Ray do? He began to accompany the fan.

Ray Charles Robinson (September 23, 1930 – June 10, 2004) was an American pop singer and pianist who became famous for performing compositions in many musical styles. He is considered the most important person music industry V post-war years.

Childhood

Ray Charles was born on September 23 in the small town of Albany, located in the state of Georgia, into a very poor black family. As the singer himself later said, they could not even be compared with just poor families:

"I was born in an incredible poor family, as poor as one can imagine, the very bottom of the stairs, below there is only bare and damp earth...”

His father took virtually no part in raising the children, so all worries fell on the shoulders of his mother, aunt Aretha and mother-in-law Mary Jay Robinson. Later, when Ray was 2 years old, his father left the family completely and disappeared. The future singer did not know where he was and with whom he lived.

At the age of five, Ray suffered a misfortune. He witnessed his brother begin to drown in a large bathtub. Since he was much larger and healthier than himself, the boy could not save him on his own, and there was simply no one to call for help. Women at that time were in the city to earn money. As a result, brother George died, and Ray withdrew into himself for a long time. The severe shock and shock of not being able to save his own brother drove the child to a serious illness, as a result of which he began to go blind. Even the doctors were unable to help. Two years later, Ray completely lost his sight.

Since a blind child could not attend regular high school, his mother sent him to a boarding school in St. Augustine, where the boy was forced to learn Braille and adapt to an unusual condition, which, alas, could not be changed in any way. At the same age, his musical talent began to manifest itself. With the help of the owner of the pharmacy, which was located not far from the house, Ray began to learn to play the piano and sing. At school, he asked to join clubs where they taught how to play on others. musical instruments. He ended up learning to play the clarinet, trombone, saxophone and organ in just one year.

Beginning of a musical career

After graduating from boarding school, Ray decided not to go to university, because he perfectly understood that it would be impossible to do this due to both financial and physiological circumstances. However, his desire to be a musician did not disappear. On the contrary, the guy dreamed of becoming a professional singer and earning money in order to be able to take care of his loved ones.

In 1947, after several years of saving money through part-time construction jobs, Ray finally decides to move to Seattle, since in his hometown music had always been the last priority for the poor and hungry residents. There, in Seattle, he meets aspiring guitarist Gossady McGee, who would later become one of Ray Charles's best friends, as well as the founder of a group called the MacSon Trio. And since the group’s songs in jazz and country styles almost immediately gain their listeners, the recording studio Swingtime Records becomes interested in the group, which invites two talented guys to start writing compositions under their label. “Walkin" and Talkin"", "Guitar Blues" and "Wonderin" and Wonderin"" are released.

Being “under the wing” of a record company, young and talented musicians soon began to realize that songwriting was becoming more and more a mechanical process for them, and not at all a creative process. And if previously company representatives took on every new single their groups, then they begin to dictate their rights and set boundaries. Ray did not like this approach to creativity most of all, so in 1952 he terminated the contract and entered into a new one. Now with the record company Atlantic Records. There he not only releases his best songs, but with their help he also finds a new, ideal sound for himself, which later becomes his calling card.

In the 1960s, Ray Charles and his incomparable songs filled with vital energy were already known almost all over the world. At the same time, the singer again changed the recording studio and began collaborating with ABC Records, which at that time produced the most talented, famous and highly paid performers. Ray moves to Beverly Hills, where he begins to actively write songs. At this time, such singles as “Unchain My Heart”, “Georgia On My Mind”, “Cry”, “Makin" Whoopee”, “Busted”, “I Can't Stop Loving” were born and became popular from the first minutes. You" and "You Don't Know Me".

Drug addiction

Throughout his life, Ray Charles was addicted to drugs. He did not hide this fact and himself admitted that he first tried marijuana when he was still a 16-year-old teenager.

In 1961, the police found several bags of marijuana and cocaine in the singer's hotel room. A criminal case is initiated, but the lawyers manage to obtain only a suspended sentence for Ray, since at that time the star was already undergoing treatment for drug addiction in a Los Angeles clinic.

Four years later, Ray Charles is found to be in possession of drugs again. This time packs of heroin. However, the singer is again acquitted, after which he completely abandons drugs and begins to act as an active adherent healthy life.

Personal life

Ray Charles gained fame all over the world not only thanks to his excellent vocal abilities, but also his love for the female sex. The singer had 12 children, most of whom were born out of wedlock. If we talk about his official spouses, then they were only three women: Eileen Williams (lived together for a year, no children), Della Beatrice Howard Robinson (20 years of marriage and three children) and Norma Pinella (lived with Ray in a civil marriage until his death).

This distinguished singer, pianist and composer was called Brother Ray and the Genius, but his real name was Ray Charles Robinson, under which he was born on September 23, 1930. In the very early childhood the boy was struck by glaucoma, and by the age of seven he completely lost his sight. Ray studied at a Florida school for deaf and blind children: there he mastered reading by the Braille method, and was also actively involved in music. Over the course of several years, the guy began to play various instruments well, such as classical piano, organ, trumpet, alto saxophone and clarinet, and in addition began to compose his own compositions. At the age of 16, Ray was already a professional musician and performed with various Florida groups. In 1948, he moved to Seattle, where he first founded the jazz-blues project "The Maxim Trio" and then began a solo career, taking the stage name Ray Charles. For several years the artist worked at Swingtime Records, trying to copy the style of Nat "King" Cole and Charles Brown. His first records were not particularly successful, but in 1951 the single “Baby, Let Me Hold Your Hand” broke into the rhythm and blues charts and attracted the attention of major record labels.

It ended with Atlantic Records buying the contract from Swingtime for $2,500. Given greater freedom of action, Ray began to develop his own style and after some time found the desired form. Taking the gospel song "Jesus Is All The World To Me", Charles layered it with worldly lyrics, added some danceability and scored his first major hit with "I Got A Woman" (later called the first real soul record). From that moment on, the musician’s popularity began to grow steadily, and in 1958 he confirmed his title rising star, triumphantly performing at the prestigious Newport Jazz Festival.

Throughout the 50s, Charles recorded a lot of great songs (including "This Little Girl Of Mine", "Drown In My Own Tears", "Hallelujah I Love Her So", "Lonely Avenue", "The Right Time"), but His most successful work of the “Atlantic” period was the composition “What”d I Say,” which landed in the Top 10 on both the rhythm and blues and pop charts. In 1959, another number one single was released, “ Georgia On My Mind". Originally written for the girl Georgia, this composition later became the official state anthem of the same name. By the way, Ray Charles did not confine himself to the song genre and could, in parallel with albums with vocals, release discs with jazz instrumentals like "The Great Ray Charles ". In the early 60s, the musician moved to ABC Paramount Records, where he was promised an additional degree of creative freedom and was given the opportunity to create his own sub-label, Tangerine Records. One of the first works at the new place was an album with the transparent title "Genius + Soul = Jazz." The record took fourth place on Billboard, and a few months later Ray released his most famous track, "Hit The Road Jack". Another famous pop hit, "Unchain My Heart", was released in 1962, after which the musician unexpectedly (and very successfully) turned towards country with the album "Modern Sounds In Country And Western Music".

The disc went to the very top of Billboard, stayed on the charts for three months and brought Charles a Grammy for the song “I Can't Stop Loving You.” The sequel, “Modern Sounds In Country And Western Music Volume Two” (No. 2), was also a success ), and two other albums from the early 60s were included in hot ten, but in 1965, Ray's career was suspended due to his arrest on charges of heroin possession. True, he managed to avoid prison, but it took the musician a whole year to recover from his bad habit. Having finished with the unpleasant procedures, the artist returned to creativity, but the peak of his popularity had already passed, and his career went downhill. In the late 60s, Charles made two successful Beatles covers, "Yesterday" and "Eleanor Rigby", but his own material left much to be desired. Ray increasingly gravitated towards light orchestral pop, sometimes invading the territory of jazz and country, and fans could now hear his signature soul only at concerts.

And yet, the artist’s early achievements were not forgotten: in 1976, Charles’s name was included in the “Songwriters” Hall Of Fame, in 1979 – in the “Georgia Music Hall Of Fame”, and in 1986 he became one of the first musicians inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, his popularity was maintained in several other ways: for example, by appearing in the movie “The Blues Brothers,” performing his version of “America The Beautiful” at Ronald Reagan’s inauguration, and participating in Diet commercials. cola." In 1973, Ray parted ways with ABC Records and began releasing discs on his own company, Crossover Records, and the arrangement of Wonder's "Living For" recorded in 1975 The City"brought him another Grammy. A little later, the artist's relationship with Atlantic Records was renewed, but by the end of the decade the label became more interested in rockers, and there was little attention left for soulsters. Most of The artist spent the 80s under the roof of "Columbia", and the only relatively major achievement of this period was the country album "Friendship" (No. 75). Also in 1986, Ray founded a personal foundation aimed at supporting young people with hearing loss.

In the early 90s, Charles continued to release new discs for Warner Bros., but he remained more in demand at concerts. His last studio work was the album of duets "Genius Loves Company", recorded with the participation of B.B. King, Van Morrison, Norah Jones, James Taylor, Elton John, Diana Krall and a number of other famous personalities. Although the record returned him to the top of Billboard, the Genius himself no longer saw his triumph - two months before the release on June 10, 2004, he died at his home in Beverly Hills. In 2005 and 2006, two more posthumous albums were released: again collected from the duets “Genius & Friends” and “Ray Sings, Basie Swings” with recordings from the mid-70s, where Ray Charles sang accompanied by the Count Basie Orchestra.