Liner Notes

Ray Charles: Love Songs

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Ray Charles: Love Songs

This album marries the two great interests of Ray Charles' life by bringing together, for the first time, a collection of his love songs. Some are wry, some sly, some elegiac, some sad, but they all demonstrate how Ray uses one of his great loves, music, to convey his feelings about his other great love, women.

Like Ray himself, this collection defies categorization. There's R&B ("Gee, Baby Ain't I Good To You") and country ("I Can't Stop Loving You"). There are standards ("Georgia On My Mind" and "Come Rain Or Come Shine"), show tunes ("Bess, You Is My Woman"), and ballads ("Ruby"). There's a collaboration with Betty Carter on the sublime "Baby, It's Cold Outside" which is, to my mind, the greatest duet ever recorded. Then there's an astonishing version of "You Are My Sunshine" that FEATUREs the other woman who brought out the best in Ray, Margie Hendrix. And more, and more, and more.

In these songs Ray pays homage to the women who inspire him, taunt him, care for him, and make him what he is. There's love here, plus a good measure of respect, and even a healthy dose of lust. And above all, there's great music.

A quick note on how Ray picks a song to sing or to record. Whereas other artists might fall for a hook or be swayed by fashion, commercialism, or an overzealous producer, Ray zeros in on what a song is about. "For me a song's got to have a story," he told me recently. "It's got to talk to me, tell me something, take me somewhere--not just sound good." But the process doesn't end there. "For me to do it," he elaborated, "I've got to figure out what I can bring to it, how I can make it mine."

When Ray Charles elects to do a song, the result goes way beyond interpretation--the song becomes his. As proof, take a listen to his magical version of a chestnut like "You Made Me Love You (I Didn't Want To Do It"). Or even better, check out a song you've heard a hundred, a thousand, or maybe a million times before: "Georgia On My Mind." It may have been written by Hoagy Carmichael and Stuart Gorrell. It may have been recorded by Frankie Trumbauer, Willie Nelson, and scores of others. But now and for evermore it belongs to only one man: Ray Charles.

THE SONGS

I CAN'T STOP LOVING YOU

What we now think of as a classic, a breathtaking paean to a woman, was initially viewed as both an iconoclastic act and a piece of reckless folly. An R&B singer doing what was then known as "country & western"? With string arrangements by Marty Paich? To quote Sid Feller, who produced the session: "When Sam Clark and the other execs at ABC/Paramount heard what Ray wanted to do, first they thought he was putting them on. Then, when they realized he was serious, they thought his craziness was going to put 'em out of business."

Even when the cut proved to be a gem, ABC felt stymied, for Ray, whose contract gave him final say, said there would be no singles--what was then the principal means of promotion. Until, that is, Sid Feller informed him that another label was putting out a Tab Hunter cover that "borrowed" Ray's arrangement. Ray's version of the Don Gibson song became a giant hit, and one of the world's great love songs.

COME RAIN OR COME SHINE

Going back to Ray's last days at Atlantic--and not released until after he had gone to ABC/Paramount--this song shows the artist in a transitional period. Moving away from the customary R&B repertoire, and backed by session men from the jazz world, including Bobby Brookmeyer on valve trombone, Ray creates a fascinating hybrid midway between R&B and jazz. Even the producing credits reflect the convergence, shared as they are by Atlantic's resident jazz specialist, Nesuhi Ertegun, plus R&B whiz Jerry Wexler. Most important of all, an old chestnut comes alive, in the process becoming a haunting love song.

BABY, IT'S COLD OUTSIDE

Sly and wry, with a sophistication that's leavened by hints of earthiness, this is the sound of seduction, yet with a twist. Though Ray plays the seducer and Betty Carter the innocent, their interaction makes it clear that there's complicity between the two. In other words, to steal the title from another song they did together, it "Takes Two To Tango," meaning that if Betty really wanted to go, there was nothing stopping her. But then, "Maybe just a cigarette more."

It's tough to picture Frank Loesser, who wrote the songs for that greatest of musicals, Guys And Dolls, imagining a horn section that would include Hank Crawford, Leroy Cooper, David "Fathead" Newman, and Phil Guilbeau, but my guess is he would have been thrilled.

There are so many great Ray Charles songs that I would be hard-pressed to pick a favorite. But if I had to choose one cut to take with me to a desert island, well, this might just be it.

GEE, BABY AIN'T I GOOD TO YOU

Reaching way back into the songbook for a tune written by Don Redman and the great Andy Razaf (whose songwriting credits go back to numbers composed with Fats Waller), Ray has fun showing off his prowess on the acoustic piano, all the while playing the sly seducer. Listen and enjoy while he milks the words diamond ring, then makes Eldorado sound unspeakably illicit. Ray's ability to savor, and flavor, lyrics has rarely been on display as vividly as it is here.

GEORGIA ON MY MIND

When I asked Ray a question that's been raised often over the years--whether this song is about a woman or a state--he gave me a wonderfully cryptic answer. "Even if it is about a place," he said, "I sing it like it's about a woman." Then, with a sly smile, he added, "If it's about a place."

Though Ray's version is now the official song of the state in which he was born, there's no question that he treats it not as a piece of Southern nostalgia, but indeed as a love song--a tune for, and about, a very specific and special woman. Listen to the way he woos her, nuzzles her, caresses her. It's not just wistfulness in Ray's voice; there's something carnal as well.

YOU ARE MY SUNSHINE

In contrast to the songs on Modern Sounds In Country And Western Music, on which Ray surprised one and all by moving R&B into a country setting, this tune that kicked off Modern Sounds . . . Volume 2 goes the opposite route--taking a country song and bringing it into an R&B arrangement. It's a safe bet that neither Jimmie Davis, who wrote it with Charles Mitchell and then recorded it himself, nor Gene Autry, who covered it in 1941, ever imagined this sugar-coated ditty could have so much heart and soul.

Check out the great Margie Hendrix, who was sometimes referred to as a Raelett but was actually billed as a FEATUREd singer, helping Ray bring this baby into church. Like no other vocalist on earth, except maybe the sublime Betty Carter, Margie brought out the best in Ray--and only she could match him growl for growl, roar for roar.

BESS, YOU IS MY WOMAN

A personal favorite of Ray's, this is yet another example of his eagerness to stretch his talent and venture into uncharted terrain. Moving into Gershwin territory, Ray makes no effort to affect an operatic, Paul Robeson-like quality. Instead he personalizes the song, imbuing it with feeling that can only come from the heart. Listen to the pride. Listen to the hard-earned feeling of triumph that he can barely believe--and isn't quite sure will last. Imagine if instead of merely recording "Porgy & Bess" with Cleo Laine, Ray, who loves to act, had actually performed in a stage or screen version.

I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT TIME IT WAS

Here's Ray using guile in a most telling way as he goes to town on a Rodgers & Hart classic. Playing it debonair at first, he enunciates in a sophisticated style that would do Jimmy Scott or Mel Tormé proud--seducing, with his diction and stylish ways, both the woman to whom he's singing and the listener as well.

Then, once the hypothetical woman is his--as are we--Ray sheds all claim to sophistication and gets down to it in a spoken vamp that's funky, earthy, and entirely his. By the time he's saying, "Have mercy" and "Lookin' good," there's no reason for anything but getting down to basics, and it sure sounds like fun.

SOMEDAY

In describing his versatility, Ray often uses a baseball term. "I'm a utility guy," he likes to say. "You can put me at second base, behind the plate, in the outfield, wherever."

To me, that's just Ray being modest, for in truth he's done exemplary work--indeed, often the groundbreaking work--in most every genre of popular music: R&B, country, rock 'n' roll, and soul, all the while making astonishing forays into jazz, pop, show tunes, and the like. Here, in order to try something new and different, he ventures into Sinatra country, with results that are positively satisfying.

Who would have thought, way back when, that the man responsible for "This Little Girl of Mine" and "What'd I Say (Part 1)" would be singing a tune like this? But it's the result that counts, and it swings.

RUBY

Taken from an early concept album called Dedicated To You, in which every song title is a woman's name, this is one of Ray's most haunting genre-benders. Starting out as an R&B song, it very subtly shifts gears into the kind of jazz heard back then in smoky clubs.

Hank Crawford, who played alto for the band and also spent years as musical director, said very astutely that categories never applied to Ray's music. It didn't matter whether the band was playing what's nominally called R&B, jazz, or whatever. Nomenclature aside, the instruments were always used like voices--specifically the voices in a gospel group. Listen, and you'll hear that in "Ruby."

HOW DEEP IS THE OCEAN (HOW HIGH IS THE SKY)

Eager to try his hand at every type of music, here Ray moves into the world of ballads. The result, happily, is gorgeous: a chestnut is turned into a song for all time.

In classic Ray fashion, though, good enough is never quite good enough--there's got to be something different, something distinctive, something only he would do that makes this rendition entirely his. In this case, it's something completely out of left field that takes place in the last verse, when Ray goes into a falsetto, which he keeps up through the end of the song.

TILL THERE WAS YOU

The great Dizzy Gillespie, who was a huge Ray Charles aficionado, once said something quite telling about his buddy Ray. "Lots of cats have the confidence to slow things down," Dizzy said. "But only Ray Charles has the guts to go slow, slower, slowest. And the crazy part is, he still makes the music swing." This is Ray slowing things down, all right. The result, interestingly, is almost pure feeling.

WHAT WOULD I DO WITHOUT YOU

Going way back to his Atlantic years--1955, to be exact--"What Would I Do Without You" finds Ray having a ball at the acoustic piano, accompanied by a small group that includes Don Wilkerson on tenor and Panama Francis on drums. The youthfulness and joy in Ray's performance are unmistakable, as is the clarity that comes from the crisp, clear production.

It should be noted that Atlantic Records' founder Ahmet Ertegun, who produced this cut with Jerry Wexler, credits Ray with providing the direction in the sessions they did together. "Everything I know about producing," Ahmet told me, "I learned from Ray Charles."

I LOVE YOU SO MUCH IT HURTS

This is Ray at his most romantic, in a lush setting complete with a vocal chorus and strings. But whereas a production this rich can overpower some vocalists--or be used to compensate for certain deficiencies--such is not the case here; the soul of Ray Charles is very much in evidence.

Full of guile, which he uses to complement his talents, Ray knows how to take advantage of the roughness in his voice as a counterpoint to an arrangement that could otherwise tend toward the syrupy. Thanks to Ray, romance triumphs.

YOURS

Ray eliminates all pyrotechnics so as to make this a gloriously unadulterated love song, a song about love in its purest form. It becomes an ode to women--and an offering to a specific woman--with no hint of irony, ulterior motive, or even lust. Just pure affection, mixed with a winning display of adoration.

A SONG FOR YOU

The man known as the Genius meets the songwriter known in the '60s as the Master of Space and Time? And with Richard Perry as producer? Though the matchup was bizarre--and the rapport in the studio questionable at best--Ray has overcome obstacles far more daunting.

The work that resulted from this collaboration, though strange in some ways, is ultimately quite winning, as Ray, on both musical talent and strength of personality, fights Perry's tendency for overproduction and wins, turning this into a memorable love song.

--Alan Swyer

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