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The Blues Foundation preserves blues heritage, celebrates blues recording and performance, expands worldwide awareness of the blues, and ensures the future of the uniquely American art form. The Blues Hall of Fame is a program of The Blues Foundation and honors those who have made the Blues timeless through performance, documentation, and recording. For more information and to become a member, visit www.blues.org.
Episodes

Wednesday Oct 04, 2017
019 - Ray Charles
Wednesday Oct 04, 2017
Wednesday Oct 04, 2017
The Blues Foundation Podcast - Season 1: Blues Hall of Fame
Ray Charles, blind since the age of 7 and orphaned at 14, did blues, jazz, and gospel as well as anyone before or since.
And, by doing them all together at once, he pioneered what we soon came to recognize as Soul.
That’s right. Ray Charles is the father of that whole genre.
Furthermore, he took these forms of Black American music, mingled them just enough with contemporary pop sounds and had massive crossover success. Ray Charles was one of the very first African American artists to be granted full, creative control of his career by a major record label.
Ray Charles had a nickname. Some say it was given to him by Sinatra himself. However he got it, it stuck, and people referred to him as "The Genius."
Pretty appropriate, don’t you think?
This is his story.
Ray Charles inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 1982.
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