Reviews
 Keep It Simple
Van Morrison
Roger McGuinn @ the Huntington IMAC, Long Island, NY - April 4, 2008
Emily Saxe @ the Allen Room/Jazz at Lincoln Center - April 5, 2008
Another Country
Tift Merritt
Be Your Own Pet
Get Awkward
Paul McCartney – The McCartney Years (DVD)
Juno – Music from the Motion Picture
Various Artists
Yes - Their Definitive Story
Day and Night Driving
Seven Mary Three
InterMedia Arts Center 2/2/08
Huntington, NY
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Ray Charles
From today’s perspective, it is very, very hard to recognize this album for the all-time genre-busting classic that it is. Sure, the material stands up fabulously well, and the performances are all Ray Charles at his absolute best, but it is easy to miss just how provocative this album was in its time. Today, it is only natural for artists to ‘cross-breed’ ideas and mix styles, but in the early sixties, things were much more, ummm, Black and White. Keep in mind that only a few years before this album was made, recordings made by African-Americans were referred to as “Race” music. So, what the hell does it mean when a ‘Race’ artist records an album of ‘hillbilly’ classics? Well, fer instance, if the shoe was on the other foot, George Jones might’ve released an album called “My Favorite Negro Spirituals”, or Ferlin Husky could’ve recorded “Modernized Niggra Field Hollers”. I doubt that either of ‘em would have made much of an impression (except in terms of their subsequent political incorrectness), but Ray Charles’ move was almost equally as bold, if not quite as foolhardy. By adopting a musical form that was almost exclusively ‘White’ in its lineage, and then adding his own form of down-home grit (which, by the way, included some very extraordinary elements for anything referred to as ‘down-home’, such as string orchestras and choruses), Ray Charles reinvented a part of White America’s heritage. After this album, Country music would never be the same.
The universal appeal of Ray Charles’ touch is simply inarguable, and many of these recordings have gone on to become definitive versions. Who can sing “I Can’t Stop Loving You” without resurrecting a piece of this extraordinary arrangement? The same can be said for “You Don’t Know Me”, “I Love You So Much It Hurts” and the sublime “Born to Lose”. Ray Charles didn’t record them first, but he made them his own. Subsequent artists, white or black, who attempted their own renditions of these songs would simply need to pay homage to Ray Charles. From this point forward, each of these songs became soulful, R&B-based classics. They retained their ‘country’ identity as well, but in the hands of Ray Charles, they are both. Equally, and at the same time. That is genre-crossing at its definitive best.
Grade: 
 
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