I think Kanye should have gotten song of the year, no competition, in my mind. And how is he mispronouncing his name?
Kan-ye
Makes sense to me.
Also, the only reason I have a dog in this fight is because a local musician, Rhymefest, co-wrote Jesus Walks with Kanye West and I wanted to see him win that Grammy with him. Plus, he’s a lot better than that pussy John Mayer.
Now there’s somebody I hope lives into his late hundreds. That way, by the time he dies, he won’t even be a footnote, and we won’t have to hear weeks’ worth of lame tributes and testimonials.
I don’t really have a problem with Ray Charles getting awards. It’s expected when someone dies with a current recording out there to qualify them for an award. Besides award shows are never really much of an indication of what’s good, there’s too much sentimentality and politics involved with people’s decisions.
Re: Bandwagon jumpers. This isn’t always a bad thing, some people may not have been that familiar with his work and maybe only became familiar after his death or after seeing the movie and became a fan, I don’t see anything wrong with that.
I’ve seen or heard of groups after a popular appearance or a song used on a TV show or movie which makes them more well known. I don’t think it lessens my being a fan because I hadn’t heard of them before they became main stream. Music snobs who suddenly decide a group isn’t cool anymore once they become popular annoy the crap out of me.
Re: Jamie Foxx on the Grammy’s. Now I think that was bad taste. If they wanted Alicia Keys to do a duet with Ray Charles then why not do the old Natalie Cole/Nat King Cole trick and have her perform with a recording/video of Ray? Or have a contemporary of Ray sing for Ray? Instead they had an actor portray Ray. No matter how good his portrayal of Ray Charles or close his singing may have sounded like Ray’s, that just seemed wrong.
Then again I think it’s wrong to have anyone but other people in the music business as presenters, let alone performers.
If I remember correcly, you were doing the Birdland all night long. 
Very cool post, Zoe
Ray Charles was overrated, IMO.
It’s a shame Jimmy Smith never got the attention he deserved. He was incredible.
Thirded.
Before Ray, it was a sugary song for schoolchildren. Charles’ version makes me tear up a bit every time I hear it.
Jimmy Smith, my favorite organ player ever. He was one of the greats, and he tore down boundaries between jazz and soul. But he never had the mainstream recognition and acceptance that Ray Charles did, and the fact that Smith wasn’t a singer didn’t help. American audiences will never truly embrace instrumental music again like they did in the '30s and '40s.
I’ve seen this kind of disdain a couple places in this thread, and I’m just wondering…why isn’t it allowed to discover that you like a musician’s work through a biopic or because you hear a lot of it when they die? Obviously it’s annoying when people do it because it’s the Cool Thing ™, but, for instance…I really hadn’t been exposed to that much of Ray Charles’ stuff before seeing Ray. Is my new-found appreciation of his music in some way illegitimate because I didn’t discover it through music geek-sanctioned channels?
Sorry for the hijack, but this attitude sticks in my craw. I do my own fair share of discovery by reading reviews and finding out who influenced or sounds like the bands and artists I like, but sometimes a movie soundtrack gets around to me first, often with things I never would have thought to look at otherwise. People can’t always help coming upon things late in the game, or choose how it happens.
As for all the constant praise: yeah, it’s annoying, but from what I can tell, the man did deserve it. It’ll pass and someone else’ll die and we’ll start in on them instead.
Are you kidding me here? Ray Charles overblown? The man was a genius, if you havent seen Ray you should. Gives a whole new perspective on him, even for a fan like myself. And lets not forget, this man did all this in a era were black people were not treated as people, and, my God, he was freakin blind!!
I mean imagine being blind in general. That would be hard enough. Now be a blind black man in the Crow law era. Now be blind, black, in Crow era, and freaking learn to play music and tour!! Thats crazy. Even if you dont like his music, give credit where credit is due.
BTW, I hope no one thinks I was saying that Ray Charles doesn’t DESERVE the status of legend when I said in real life he wasn’t such a nice guy, because I’m not. I was just saying we shouldn’t elevate him to sainthood. But musically, the man kicked serious ass.
Amen to what Zoe said.
And:
I concur, as do a whole lot of other people.
And yeah, I guess if you transpose two letters in someone’s name (who tf is Kayne?) then, yeah, it will sound wrong to you when everyone else pronounces it right.
My freshman year in college there was one Black student. He ate by himself and was alone whenever I saw him on campus. I can even remember overhearing a conversation among girls in the dorm about what they would do if he came over and sat at the table to eat with them. That was in the fall of 1961.
In January of 1963, I can remember most of us dancing with another Black male to well worn LP’s of Ray Charles music at a fraternity party. Wall’s were coming down like crazy and Ray and friends were the background music for our celebration of each other.
If you see the movie Ray, look for the changes in his audiences.
For those of you who have a hard time understanding the reverence for this old man, try to look at it this way:
Pick your favorite band – the one that you think has something special and unique. Imagine that this band goes with you through the next fifty years of your life. They’re there at your graduation parties, keg parties, the night you meet someone special, when you break up, when you know you are going to survive, at your wedding reception, when your child is born, at your holiday gatherings, midnight drives with the top down, lonely nights when you don’t know which way to turn, when you find the right questions to ask, when you know the good times are back, when your dad dies, when your grandchild makes you laugh hard and likes your band too.
Then your band – much loved by a lot of old people and some younger ones too – is honored and passes into history at about the same time.
You won’t expect anyone else to understand quite the way you do. You just hope they can be so lucky to find someone or some group to go with them most of the way.
“God bless the child that’s got his own…”
Timothy White also has a solid if brief bio of Ray Charles in Rock Lives, which I highly recommend for people who don’t “get it.”
I’ll be the first to admit that his original-issue albums can be WILDLY uneven at times, but any good collection, like the 50th anniversary one above or even the movie soundtrack, illustrates that the man had more than his share of jaw-dropping moments.
Addressing the “hyperbole” from earlier:
Although I’m not a fan of his Grammy-winning album of this past year, I do have to add, just to fight some ignorance, that Genius Loves Company consisted of new recordings made and completed before Ray’s passing. These are not artificially assembled “duets” along the lines of “Unforgettable.”
The implied assertion made earlier in this thread that Ray’s original fifties and sixties recordings were used to construct the new release is flat-out wrong, and a quick comparative listen and check on the recording dates within the booklet will confirm that to anyone who wants to take the time.
Were he still alive, anyone who’d like to suggest that Ray was a “cute and amusing novelty” deserves to spend a few minutes alone in a room with Ray after telling him that. And God help them.
There is absolutely NO reason you should not feel as touched by a musician, a band, a piece of artwork, whatever, as ANY “old-timer” is.
Unless, like my step-sister, you’ve spent years mocking my taste, and THEN you jump on the bandwagon and proclaim yourself the #1 fan.
…Gonna’ send you back to Arkansas! 
I already had a Ray Charles album or two when I went to a concert of his in Atlanta, maybe '60 or '61, in a stadium. Among other things, he brought the house down with Night Time is the Right Time and What’d I Say?.
He was fantastic back then, and his music was different from what others were doing at the time. I’ve still got six or seven old 33&1/3 RPM albums of Ray’s.
Re: “Soul Music”: I think Ray may have pretty much started it. The group that someone mentioned above “Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers” was a gospel group. The “Soul” part of their title was a religious reference and didn’t pertain to a type of music. By the time Sam Cooke came out with his first big hit, You Send Me, he was no longer associated with the Soul Stirrers. Etta James and Hank Ballard & the Midnighters made music that was close to Ray’s, but still different.
The first reference I can recall of “Soul” in that kind of music was in Ray Charles’s song One Mint Julep. There was a line in there;" Just a little bit of soul now."
At least that’s the way I remember it.
Anyway, I’m all for any recognition Ray Charles gets.
…absolutely nobody in all the years they’ve been foisted on the elderly population at large. :smack:
I guess flu shots are akin to an enema - it may not do much but it can’t hurt. :rolleyes:
Please ignore above… it’s supposed to be a separet post… <smack> preview <smack> preview <smack> preview
s-e-p-a-r-a-t-e … oh just fuck it!
Don’t stop now, you’re on a roll!
I would just like to point out here that Ray Charles and I have the same last name. I think we must be related. I’m also a fan, but because I really, really, really like his music. Kinship, drugs, and/or womanizing don’t change that.
I also like Louis Armstrong, and don’t feel the two are mutually exclusive.
Note to potential bubble bursters: yes, I’m aware of the claim that his real last name is Robinson. I don’t choose to accept that.
I’m printing out Zoe’s post and framing it.