Ray Charles & The Raelettes Playbacking Crying Time At Grammy Show

Probably a set photo from this show.

Ray Charles after the ceremony where he
accepted his Grammy for Crying Time.
With Ray Conniff and Joanie Sommers.

This awkward clip (see how The Raelettes appear to have sunk into the studio floor) looks like a(n extremely rare) example of Ray Charles and the girls playbacking a song. It comes from The Best On Record, a TV special produced for the 9th Grammy Awards, taped on 2 March 1967, and broadcast the next day. The Grammy website describes Ray's part in the show as "After singing a few bars of I Can’t Stop Loving You, Frankie Avalon and Buddy Greco joked that anyone who sings like Ray Charles was 'Italian, whether he wants to be or not.' They then introduced Charles as 'one of the greatest Italian singers,' before the Genius of Soul performed his classic version of Crying Time for which he had won the Grammys for Best Rhythm & Blues Recording and Best R&B Solo Vocal Performance, Male or Female."

Contact sheet; Ray Charles bottom left & right during the award ceremonies; (c) Michael Ochs Archives / Getty Images.

* The line-up in this show is: Alex Brown, Merry Clayton, Gwen Berry, Clydie King. The lead vocal on the original recording was delivered by Lillie Fort.

This Time (I’ll Be the Fool) - Ft. Madelyn Quebec

A substantial part (i.e. about half) of Ray Charles' 1st concert at the Northsea Jazz Festival on July 13, 1980, has just emerged on YouTube for the first time.

The cameras caught The Genius in excellent condition, and in a playful mood (watch him fool with his rhythm section, and hear him deliver some rare scatting in the final!), but the big and pleasant surprise is the rendition of This Time (I'll Be The Fool), starring Madelyn Quebec.

The newly found footage, starting with Madelyn:


Ray Charles - vocals, piano, el. piano; Mitch Manker, Doug Crescimano, Tom Swayzee, Doug Martin - trumpets; Art Velasco, Dan Marcus, Papo Vázquez, Steve Davis - trombones; Ricky Woodard, Clifford Solomon, Ira Weinstein, Rudy Johnson, Mark Roland - saxophones; Tony Matthews - guitar; Curtis Ohlson - bass; Peter Turre - drums; James Polk - keyboards. Raelettes: Estella Yarbrough, Pat Peterson, Madelyn Quebec, Trudy Cohran, Avis Harrell.

06. Don't You Love Me Anymore
07. Intro Raelettes (by RC)
08. Love Is What We Need (ft. Estella Yarbrough)
09. Knock On Wood (ft. Trudy Cohran)
10. I Can't Stop Loving You
11. I Can See Clearly Now
12. This Time (I'll Be The Fool) (ft. Madelyn Quebec)
13. I'm Gonna Keep On Singin'
14. What'd I Say
15. Outro

In 1975 Ray had produced and co-engineered a recording of This Time by Darrow Fletcher for his Crossover label (the B-side of CR-983, 1975, b/w We've Got To Get An Understanding); the song was also released on the compilation album Darrow Fletcher ‎– Crossover Records 1975-79 - Soul Sessions (Kent Soul - CDKEND 382, 2012).*

Darrow's 1975 recording:


* Many thanks to Joël Dufour.