EP 30: Ray Charles: That Cat Has Nine Lives.

If you know anything about popular music you most certainly have heard of Ray Charles. If you are a fan of jazz, R&B and the blues you probably know his R&B recordings. But during the 1960s he succeeded as a cross over artist and placed over a dozen albums and over sixty singles on the Billboard popular music and R&B charts. From there he became a master of Country Western music, expanding the genera and proving the mass appeal of Country music.Ray Charles is experiencing a resurgence again in 2026, with his music and legacy appearing across streaming platforms and social media,. But if you read Downbeat, Jazzwise, or All About Jazz you probably are aware of Ray Charles and Tangerine. Ray Charles did the almost unthinkable at the time for a musician — In 1962 he started his own record company called Tangerine Records. And the label is back; The Ray Charles Foundation has been releasing much of his catalog of albums as newly mastered reissues from that era in high quality tangerine colored vinyl. It is just one more direction his work has taken since Ray Charles first went into a recording studio in 1949.This episode is dedicated to Ann-Marie Rose who started listening to Ray Charles and buying his albums while still a junior high school student.