Ray Charles

Ray Charles Robinson September 23 1930 June 10 2004 better known by his shortened stage name Ray Charles was an American musician He was a pioneer in the genre of soul music during the 1950s by fusing rhythm and blues gospel and blues styles into his early recordings with Atlantic Records He also helped racially integrate country and pop music during the 1960s with his crossover success on ABC Records most notably with his Modern Sounds albums While with ABC Charles became one of the first AfricanAmerican musicians to be given artistic control by a mainstream record company Frank Sinatra called Charles the only true genius in show business Rolling Stone ranked Charles number 10 on their list of 100 Greatest Artists of All Time in 2004 and number two on their November 2008 list of 100 Greatest Singers of All Time In honoring Charles Billy Joel noted This may sound like sacrilege but I think Ray Charles was more important than Elvis Presley I dont know if Ray was the architect of rock roll but he was certainly the first guy to do a lot of things Who the hell ever put so many styles together and made it work Description above from the Wikipedia article Ray Charles licensed under CCBYSA full list of contributors on Wikipedia