We Love You Ray,
but What Were
You Thinking?
Over a breakfast of grape juice and coffee, cantaloupe
melon, store brand English muffin, a bowl of raisin bran
and milk … in the background Ray Charles and Bonnie
Raitt singing “Do I Ever Cross Your Mind”…
these thoughts about the pulse of American life …
One of my favorite musical memories comes from the summer I graduated from high
school. I’m sitting in a booth at Mama Leone’s Pizzeria on Detroit’s west side, having just been dumped by my first serious girlfriend, Lynn
Rosenthal. Mama Leone’s had those table-side juke box selectors you now see only in movies. On the box
was a countrified Ray Charles with his two-sided lover’s lament: I Can’t Stop Loving You on the “A” side with Born to Lose on the “B”. I went back many times that summer, soothing myself with the little pizzeria’s bubbly pies and Ray’s country blues.
Ray Charles died recently, a working man right to the end. Since then we’ve been celebrating his life. At the entertainment award ceremonies it has been
the year of Ray. At the Oscars Jamie Foxx took best actor for his portrayal in
the movie Ray of the blind singer and piano player, and at the Grammy Awards Charles’ final musical product, Genius Loves Company, was a big winner. Seems like everyone in America wants to show Mr. Charles how
much he meant to us.
Ray did some nice work on Genius Loves Company, singing duets with a lineup of talented collaborators. But the truth is, his
voice sounds old on the award winning CD, lacking the intensity of his more
youthful work. Of course, that doesn’t matter; it’s all about loving Ray—and even at less than his best Ray Charles is way better than most.
It was the movie Ray that got me thinking. I loved the movie for its history lesson on rhythm and
blues, the music business, black life in the south, and the racist past we
Americans still haven’t put fully behind us. Even young Ray’s troubled history was exciting to see and maybe intended to explain some of his
later behavior.
The part of the film that worried me was the all the stuff about Ray the junkie
and Ray the cheating husband. Viewed against that backdrop, what does our
posthumous adulation say about our values? Maybe it says life’s not simple, people aren’t perfect and we as people of faith ought to know that. We worry whether our
children can make those distinctions, but it does say right on the box that the
movie is “R” rated.
I have to admit being drawn to the counter-cultural picture the film opened up—the gritty bars on the “chitlin circuit,” Ray smoking marijuana like it was natural as breathing air, and then his band
mates with their shooting kit laid out warning him “the boy” was something entirely different, “the boy” being heroin as opposed to “the girl” cocaine, slang most middle class whites don’t often encounter. Then there was the honest way black club patrons were shown
living comfortably in both the secular and sacred worlds—just not at the same moment, but rising up when Charles crossed the line by
converting gospel rhythms into smoky dance club tunes. It was all a fascinating
cultural journey, except maybe having to see again what a racist pool we’ve had to crawl out of.
I watched the film with my wife and when it was over she said, “Wow, I always admired Ray Charles and now I’m not sure.” It was probably the cheating part that got to her. I won’t comment further on that except to say there’s plenty of human frailty in this world, white and black. Ray, and his wife too,
seemed to blow that off as “life on the road,” which is not to say it was right or that no one got hurt.
A professional musician friend, a Christian, tells me everyone in the business
knew Ray Charles was a junkie (he had been on the road a lot himself and also
seemed less concerned about the cheating part). He said it had been in the news
when Charles was busted for possession, so everyone should have known. Maybe we
should have, but most of us wanted so much to love Ray as an affable, sweet
singing blind man who reached out to whites with his music that we suppressed
the knowledge. The recent Ray love fest shows we are still suppressing it,
despite the movie. That’s a good thing.
He also pointed out that even in his prime Ray was more popular with whites than
with blacks. That part I remember as true. My black friends in high school
tended to shun black musicians who tried to “cross over.” Feelings were even stronger against Chuck Berry. It wasn’t a “stay off my turf” kind of thing; my friend Philip told me he loved having me listen to R&B—just as long as it was the real thing.
Watching good and bad side-by-side is always a little confusing. Traditionally,
even though we Christians like to talk about forgiveness, we spend so much
energy demanding repentance and more repentance that we never get around to
really forgiving. Fortunately, Christ wasn’t so confused. He had no problem standing in the presence of weakness and
forgiving it. The deal, he said, wasn’t to believe you had achieved righteousness, but to hunger and thirst after it.
So here’s to Ray. Whatever you were thinking, your love was so much greater than your
weakness.
All content Copyright © Gary Broughman, 2007
