Ray Sings Basie Swings

Ray Sings Basie Swings
Ray Charles and Count Basie Orchestra, Label: Concord


Ray Charles and Count Basie frequently shared the same stage, yet they never managed to make an album together, then how come this album shows both of them?

Quite an interesting story to read:

It was John Burk, a Concord executive at Fantasy Records, found a tape marked "Ray Charles and Count Basie"! No one knew about this tape, later it was found that it is a '70s concert that featured Charles and the Count Basie Orchestra playing separately. While Charles' vocals were in pristine shape, the rest of the recording, the orchestration (Ray’s own band) was pretty bad and almost useless.

What are they supposed to do, throw it away? Not at all, after all it was Ray’s voice captured at the prime of his career! So imaginative minds at Concord records put together a plan to revive these recordings. Audio engineer and producer Gregg Field, (who had played drums for both Basie and Charles, and was an arranger for Charles in '70s) started on this daunting task.

The quality of Instrumental sound on the tapes was so poor that Field decided to replace the orchestration with totally new instrumental recording. And what else would match Ray’s voice other than the contemporary Count Basie Orchestra, a pairing that would have made musical history!

Though Count Basie himself died long back in 1984, but his band has continued to further his legacy and was available to recreate the music or rather magic! Field began the painstaking process of creating a new album by surrounding Charles ’s voice with new arrangements from Count Basie Orchestra (without Basie of course). Ray’s voice was digitally isolated frame by frame, track by track and later it was mixed with instrumentation tracks created by Count Basie Orchestra. The Count Basie Orchestra recreated the original Ray Charles band's performance, note for note, with the same exact tempo, in each of the songs.

Month and month’s of efforts and the outcome is this album. Ray Charles' vocals and Count Basie's great orchestra, blend so perfectly that it is hard to believe that this is not a real, live performance! An utterly stunning performance, no other words!

Tracks worth listening:

"Let the Good Times Roll": For Charles’s vibrant vocals, crisp orchestration by Basie Orchestra

“Oh What a Beautiful Morning”: For the brass section, Charles’s delivery and phrasing.

"Georgia on My Mind”: For Charles' emotional vocals.