I started listening to Ray when I was about 10. My older brother, Rudy, had brought home the two-disc album, "Ray Charles: A Man and His Soul." He played it so much that, to this day, I can remember the song sequencing of all four sides. It may have been the first anthology of his greatest hits, and one of my favorites was "Ruby." When I started a new school for 6th grade I made a new best friend. Like me, Mike Taylor had older brothers whose musical tastes had shaped his, and he too liked "Ruby." That was his girlfriend's name. So there we were, virile 6th graders, strolling to our social club hangout--the neighborhood Dairy Queen--and crooning: They say, Ruby you're like a song, you just don't know right from wrong...
Many years later, sometime in the early 1990s, I finally had the opportunity to see Ray perform. I was thrilled, of course, but unprepared for what would transpire. When he sat down at the piano and began singing, tears spontaneously streamed from my eyes. The power of his soulful voice was simply overwhelming.
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