(The Hit Hammer is where I'm reviewing each #1 song on the Billboard Hot 100. Starting from when the chart started in 1958 and eventually working my way to the present. To see my inspiration and more information about this blog, please refer to the "Poor Little Fool" post.)
Ray Charles - "Georgia On My Mind"
Hit Number 1: November 14, 1960
Stay at Number 1: 1 Week
In a rather shocking development, a blind dude from Albany, Georgia hits the top spot on the charts. And he does it with a hell of a song. This blind dude was none other than the legendary Ray Charles, perhaps one of the best if not THE BEST piano players of all time, and an amazing soul singer. Maybe you've heard the name. He had three different number one hits, with the first being a devastatingly beautiful ode to his home state of Georgia. (I guess "Georgia" could be a woman, but considering he's from Georgia and there is no clarity that it is a woman, I'm 95% sure it's the state)
Charles was not always blind. He was born with good vision, but started to lose his vision around 5 years old. When he was 7, he was completely blind. Before he lost his vision, he gained an interest in music at the age of 3 while at Wylie Pitman's Wing Café and Pitman played "Boogie Woogie" on an old piano. Pitman then taught Charles how to play the piano. After he completely lost his vision due to glaucoma, Charles' mother then began to find a school that would accept a blind African-American musician. Even though Charles protested it, he ended up attending the Florida School for the Deaf and the Blind for a few years. He continued learning the piano there and his teacher there taught him how to use braille music, which requires you to learn the left hand movements by reading braille with the right hand and vice versa, then combining the two parts. He would play at assemblies at the school, and also played at school held socials on Halloween and George Washington's birthday. It was around this time that he even performed on the radio in St. Augustine.
Charles' mother, who he grew to be very close to, died in 1944 which devastated Charles. He would later recall that the death of his mother and his brother (who drowned at the age of 4) were the greatest tragedies of his life. He returned back to school after her funeral, but then was expelled after playing a prank on his teacher. After he was expelled he moved in with two close friends of his now late mother in Jacksonville. He played the piano for Ritz Theatre in LaVilla for over a year. After deciding that Jacksonville lacked many opportunities for Charles, he wanted to move to a bigger city. He moved to Orlando, but lived in enormous poverty, sometimes going without food for days. He wrote arrangements for a pop music band, and auditioned to play piano for Lucky Millinder and his sixteen-piece band, but was unsuccessful. I'm sure they would like a do-over on that. Charles moved yet again, this time to Tampa. He made his first recordings there, and modeled himself after Nat King Cole. He was hellbent on having his own band however, rather than keep playing for other people. So he packed his stuff up and moved again, following his friend Gossie McKee to Seattle, since the biggest radio hits came from northern cities. There, he met and befriended a 15 year old Quincy Jones.
That's finally where Charles' career began to take off. Him, McKee, and Milton Garrett had their own band, and had a #2 hit on the Billboard R&B Chart, titled "Confession Blues". After his success, he moved for the millionth time to Los Angeles and toured with Lowell Fulson as his musical director. After signing with Swing Time Records, he recorded two more top ten hits under the name "Ray Charles". Swing Time Records folded however, and that made Charles a "free agent" in the music business. He then signed to Atlantic Records, where his most successful single there was "What'd I Say" which made it to #6 on the very new Billboard Hot 100. (It's a 7) His contract at Atlantic expired, and rather than renegotiating a new contract there, he singed with ABC-Paramount. That's where he recorded "Georgia On My Mind".
"Georgia On My Mind", just like so many other songs around this time, was not first recorded by the artist that took it to #1. The song was first written, recorded, and released in 1930. (Ironically enough, the year Charles was born) But then Charles got a hold of it, and put his own twist on to the song. That twist would become legendary. The song's introduction is some soothing and almost polite sounding strings, and that makes you just want to keep listening. But then the strings shut up, and Charles' voice comes in, almost like the other instruments are bowing down to Charles and giving him his moment. In fact, all there really is from there on out is Charles and his beloved piano, and him singing about his beloved state of Georgia. It's a great showcase for Charles soulful voice, and I'm still convinced that this has to be the first #1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 that could even be considered soul. There's so much soul on this track! It's just an incredible song, and one that became so legendary that the state of Georgia adopted it as the official state song in 1979. All of this is very nice, but I think the thing that resonates the most with me about this song, is how someone who was blind nearly his whole life, could create such a masterpiece of a song, and make it sound so effortless. There weren't very many people like Charles. He was something special.
GRADE: 10/10
JUST MISSED:
Johnny Tillotson's "Poetry In Motion" peaked at #2 behind "Georgia On My Mind". That's probably a good thing, because it's not as good a song as "Georgia On My Mind". It's a 6.
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