Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music

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Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music
A photograph of Charles' head on a red background
Studio album by
ReleasedApril 1962 (1962-04)
RecordedFebruary 5, 7, and 15, 1962
Studio
Genre
Length39:33
LabelABC-Paramount
ProducerSid Feller
Ray Charles chronology
The Genius Sings the Blues
(1961)
Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music
(1962)
Ray Charles Greatest Hits (ABC)
(1962)
Singles from Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music
  1. "I Can't Stop Loving You" / "Born to Lose"
    Released: April 1962
  2. "
    You Don't Know Me" / "Careless Love
    "

    Released: July 1962

Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music is a

studio album by American singer and pianist Ray Charles. It was recorded in February 1962 at Capitol Studios in New York City and United Western Recorders in Hollywood, and released in April of that year by ABC-Paramount Records
.

The album departed further stylistically from the rhythm and blues music Charles had recorded for Atlantic Records in the 1950s. It featured country, folk, and Western music standards reworked by Charles in popular song forms of the time, including R&B, pop, and jazz. Charles produced the album with Sid Feller, who helped the singer select songs to record, and performed alongside saxophonist Hank Crawford, a string section conducted by Marty Paich, and a big band arranged by Gil Fuller and Gerald Wilson.

Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music was an immediate critical and commercial success. The album and its four hit singles brought Charles greater mainstream notice and recognition in the pop market, as well as airplay on both R&B and country radio stations. The album and its lead single, "I Can't Stop Loving You", were both certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America in 1962, as each record had sold at least 500,000 copies in the United States.

The album's integration of soul and country challenged

Civil Rights Movement. In the process of recording the album, Charles became one of the first African-American musicians to exercise complete artistic control over his own recording career. In retrospect, it has been considered by critics as his best studio record and a landmark recording in American music. According to Robert Christgau, the album "transfigured pop, prefigured soul, and defined modern country & western music."[3] It has been called one of the greatest albums of all time by publications such as Rolling Stone and Time
.

Background

After his

masters—a very valuable and lucrative deal at the time.[5] Composed by Charles himself, the single furthered Charles's mainstream appeal, while becoming a Top 10 pop hit and selling a million copies in the United States, despite the ban placed on the record by some radio stations, in response to the song's sexually-suggestive lyrics.[6] However, by the time of the release of the instrumental jazz LP Genius + Soul = Jazz (1960) for ABC's subsidiary label Impulse!, Charles had virtually given up on writing original material and had begun to follow his eclectic impulses as an interpreter.[6]

Following his

I'm Movin' On". Charles later said about the song, "When I heard Hank Snow sing 'Moving On', I loved it. And the lyrics. Keep in mind, I’m a singer, so I like lyrics. Those lyrics are great, so that’s what made me want to do it."[4] The "I'm Movin' On" sessions were his last for Atlantic.[9]

Charles's recording of his acclaimed studio effort The Genius of Ray Charles (1959) brought him closer to expressing his jazz and pop crossover ambitions. Described by one music critic as "the most important of his albums for Atlantic", the record was the first to introduce Charles's musical approach of blending his brassy R&B sound with the more middle of the road, pop-oriented style, while performing in the presence of a big band ensemble.[10] Recording of the album, as well his ABC-Paramount debut, The Genius Hits the Road (1960), a collection of place-name songs devoted to parts of the United States, expanded on Charles's thematic and conceptually-organized approach to albums rather than commercially successful singles production.[10] Inspired by this approach and his recording of "I'm Movin' On", Charles originally made plans for a single-less concept album.[8][11]

When Charles had announced that he wanted to work on an album of country music in 1961, during a period of

Tangerine label, Charles prepared his band for the recording sessions that produced Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music.[9]

Recording

Sid Feller (left) and Ray Charles in 1962

Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music was the 18th overall LP Charles had recorded.

New York, New York, at which one half of the album was recorded and produced. The other half was recorded on February 15 of that same year in United Studio B at United Western Recorders in Hollywood, California.[14][15]

Instead of drawing what he should record from memory and his knowledge of country music, Charles asked Feller, his newly appointed

Acuff-Rose Publishing (which featured the Hank Williams catalog) and Hill & Range Songs (most of which were located in Nashville, Tennessee). In doing so, he amassed around 250 songs on tape for Charles to consider recording for Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music. From New York City, Feller sent the recordings to Charles, who was living in California at the time, for him to choose.[9]
According to music essayist Daniel Cooper:

[Feller] listened to all of them to see which one he could make a Ray Charles record with. A Ray Charles version. Not copy a country & western singer's version. So in other words, by hearing the original, he knew what he didn't want to do. So consequently, he made up his own things, and some of the things he made up, you know, the melodies themselves are interpretations. Some of the ballads, that were so beautiful, he just made it sound like Ray Charles made it up, even though he was singing the exact melody of the original. And yet when Ray Charles sings it, it sounds like a brand new song.[9]

While his selections provided the album's country and western foundation, the musical

demos and pass them along to the arrangers, informing them of what he wanted to do with specific sounds. According to Feller, at one point during recording, Charles rewrote an entire botched arrangement and dictated the parts to each of the 18 backing musicians.[9]

Music and lyrics

The album's themes are about heartbreak and love, with most of the material chosen by Charles being ballads. The concept which had originally attracted the interest of Charles to this style of music was the strength he admired in writing a ballad's somber or melancholy lyrics and then performing the ballad with aesthetic and emotional stability; an element he had found to be common in even the most diverse musical genres.[13] Writer Daniel Cooper said of Charles's adaptation of country elements, "His country forays play like a series of intricate variations or like one long meditation on the expansive qualities of music commonly described as the white man's blues."[13] AllMusic's Stephen Cook writes that "Charles intones the sleepy-blue nuances of country crooners while still giving the songs a needed kick with his gospel outbursts."[1]

Despite the racial and social implications of R&B and country at the time, Charles did not agree with contemporary views of race records and other genres, including pop and country, as essentially different.[11] In an interview with Ben Fong-Torres of Rolling Stone, Charles said of the similarities between the blues and country music, "[T]he words to country songs are very earthy like the blues, see, very down. They're not as dressed up, and the people are very honest and say, 'Look, I miss you, darlin', so I went out and I got drunk in this bar.' That's the way you say it. Where in Tin Pan Alley will say, 'Oh, I missed you darling, so I went to this restaurant and I sat down and I had dinner for one.' That's cleaned up now, you see? But country songs and the blues is like it is."[11]

In an interview with music historian

piano blues.[17] Charles has said that the country album was "completely different from rhythm and blues".[18]

"You Don't Know Me" has a string and vocal ensemble production and themes of desirous unrequited love.[19] The song's narrator longs for a woman that views him as "just a friend/That's all I've ever been/For you don't know me."[19] AllMusic editor Bill Janovitz writes of the song's affecting narrative, stating "The genius, the pathos, and the soul that is Charles oozes into this recording [...] No matter how many times one hears the song, it still induces chills down the spine after the narrator blows any chance he might have had and is left alone at the end."[19]

Both composed by

countrypolitan ballad with lush, cushioned arrangements, was placed at the 11th spot in the track listing, assumed by Sid Feller to be the album's weakest song, after which becoming the album's top-selling single. Charles was disappointed with him, as Feller was in charge of sequencing for the album.[16]

Charles also covered the heartbreak ballads "It Makes No Difference Now" and "I Love You So Much It Hurts", both originally by

piano blues with string arrangements.[20]

Marketing and sales

Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music was released in April 1962[21] and quickly became one of the best-selling albums recorded by a black musician of the time, as well as one of the best-selling country albums,[7] shipping at least 500,000 copies in its first three months of release.[22] This achievement was due in part to the mainstream promotional efforts Modern Sounds had received from ABC prior to and following release.[23] The album proved to be a crossover hit as well, as distributors claimed the record had been selling in pop, R&B and country music markets; at the time, often referred to as white and black markets during the period.[23]

Writing of the album shortly after its release,

Billboard magazine claimed that, "in addition to being powerful dealer material, this package will fracture knowledgeable jockeys who will find in it a wealth of material to talk about as well as play."[23] By mid-April, reports of the album's sales and radio airplay had started coming in from cities such as Dallas and Philadelphia. On June 23, 1962, the mono issue of Modern Sounds replaced the West Side Story soundtrack album as the number one album in the United States, knocking it off the top of the Billboard Pop Albums chart.[23]

The album spawned four charting singles, "Born to Lose", "Careless Love", "I Can't Stop Loving You" and "You Don't Know Me", the latter two of which went number one on the

Billboard Pop Singles chart on June 2, spending five consecutive weeks at the top of the chart. By the time it fell off the top, the single was reported to have reached nearly a million and a half in sales, moving over 100,000 copies per week. In July the record spent two weeks at number one in Great Britain.[26]

As Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music and its singles were performing well in the United States, Charles toured Europe with his big band and

Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music, Vol. 2 was released six months after the first volume and proved to be equally successful, while also earning a gold certification by the following year.[22][27] Following his tenure with ABC-Paramount, Charles later went on to achieve more commercial success recording country music under Columbia Records throughout most of the 1980s.[28]

Critical reception

Contemporary professional reviews
Review scores
SourceRating
New Record Mirror
[29]
Retrospective professional reviews
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[30]
Blender[31]
Country Weekly[32]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music[citation needed]
Music Story[citation needed]
MusicHound R&B[33]
Q[20]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide[10]

Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music received positive reviews from critics of both rhythm and blues and country music.

1963 Grammy Awards,[35] while the album was nominated in the Album of the Year category.[citation needed
]

Since its initial reception, the album has been praised by critics for Charles's style and manner of interpreting country music into his R&B musical language.[28] Robert Hilburn of the Los Angeles Times wrote that the "masterful interpretation of several country standards ... opened a lot of pop ears to country music and showed Nashville much about the proper use of orchestration."[36] AllMusic editor Stephen Cook called the album a "fine store of inimitable interpretations", and stated, "Less modern for its country-R&B blend and lushly produced C&W tone than for its place as a high-profile crossover hit, Modern Sounds in Country and Western fit right in with Ray Charles's expansive musical ways while on the Atlantic label in the '50s".[1] Chris Neal of Country Weekly commented that Charles "recast 12 country favorites in big-band and orchestrated settings with a visionary’s easy grace", adding that he "gets to the heart of each [song] in a way that remains thoroughly modern."[32] John Morthland of the Oxford American called it a "landmark LP of transcendent vocals set against kitschy orchestrations that (along with early rock 'n' roll) illuminated black-white roots connections for a popular audience."[37]

Accolades

In 1999, the album was inducted into the

Country Music Television's list of the 100 Greatest Songs of Country Music.[citation needed] In November 2003, Rolling Stone ranked the album number 104 on its list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time,[39] and 105 in a 2012 revised list,[40] and 127 in a 2020 revised list.[41] The album was also included in Robert Christgau's "Basic Record Library" of 1950s and 1960s recordings, published in Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981).[42]

Publication Country Accolade Year Rank
Blender United States The 100 Greatest American Albums of All time[citation needed] 2002 16
Blender U.S. 500 CDs You Must Own Before You Die[citation needed] 2003 *
CMT
U.S. 40 Greatest Albums in Country Music[citation needed] 2006 2
Elvis Costello (Vanity Fair, Issue No. 483) U.S. 500 Albums You Need[43] 2005 *
Fast 'n' Bulbous U.S. The Best Albums from 1949–64[citation needed] 2005 85
Greil Marcus U.S. STRANDED: "Treasure Island" Albums[citation needed] 1979 *
Pause & Play U.S. Albums Inducted into a Time Capsule[citation needed] 2008 *
The Recording Academy U.S. Grammy Hall of Fame Albums and Songs[citation needed] 1999 *
The Review (University of Delaware) U.S. 100 Greatest Albums of All Time[citation needed] 2001 88
Robert Dimery U.S. 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die[citation needed] 2005 *
Rolling Stone U.S. The Essential 200 Rock Records[citation needed] 1997 *
Rolling Stone U.S. 500 Greatest Albums of All Time[citation needed] 2003 104
Stereophile U.S. 40 Years of Stereophile: The 40 Essential Albums[citation needed] 2002 *
Time U.S. Top 100 Albums of All Time[citation needed] 2006 *
VH1 U.S. The 100 Greatest Albums of R 'N' R[citation needed] 2001 97
Various writers U.S. Albums: 50 Years of Great Recordings[citation needed] 2005 *
John Tobler United Kingdom 100 Great Albums of the Sixties[citation needed] 1994 *
Paul Morley U.K. Words and Music: 100 Greatest Albums of All Time[citation needed] 2003 *
Exposure Canada 50 Greatest Albums not to make the Greatest Albums lists[citation needed] 2005 10
(*) designates lists that are unordered.

Legacy and influence

Country music

In the wake of Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music and its success, country music experienced an immediate increase in popularity. According to music writer Daniel Cooper, "the album raised the genre's profile", specifically

Austin Chronicle
wrote of Charles's influence through the album, stating:

Country and soul have always had a tenuous connection, undoubtedly exacerbated by the racial identifications of their respective fanbases. Yet despite the perceived disconnect between the two genres, the populist formats of both have always been more fluid and contiguous than is traditionally recognized.

rock & roll, though that middle ground has largely only served to allow soul and country to remain segregated. With his 1962 Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music, Ray Charles created the benchmark for crossing the line, highlighting the similarities in sentiment often overshadowed by sound.[45]

Summing up on the impact Modern Sounds had on country music and listeners, writer Daniel Cooper states, "There is no telling how many people, who perhaps never paid much attention to country music or even had professed to dislike it, listened anew based on the impact of having heard what Ray Charles was capable of doing with that music."

The Johnny Cash Show in 1970 and the Grand Ole Opry's 58th anniversary in 1983, the program to which he listened as a youth.[47]

Social impact

Following the album's release, Charles quickly earned an influx of white listeners and audiences at concert venues, without experiencing any fall-out from his predominantly black audience.

American songbook Ella Fitzgerald owned by then, but a country black person could take it over. Soon Charles's down-home diction, cotton-field grit, corn-pone humor and overstated shows of emotion were standard operating procedure in American music, black and white."[49]

In addition to its social implications, the musical integration of soul and country into popular format by Charles changed and revolutionized

About.com was one of several writers to praise the album's musical and social implications, stating "Arguably one of the most brilliant interpretive albums ever released, it did more to integrate modern American music than almost any other LP in history."[51] In paying tribute to the magazine's selection of the 100 Greatest Singers of All Time, which had selected Charles at #2, singer-songwriter Billy Joel noted the album's racial and social impact in an article for Rolling Stone, stating "here is a black man giving you the whitest possible music in the blackest possible way, while all hell is breaking loose with the civil rights movement."[52] Another article for Rolling Stone, written in honor of Charles and his achievements, later stated that through his Modern Sounds recordings, Ray Charles "made it acceptable for black people to sing country & western music, in the process doing almost as much to break down racial barriers as did the civil-rights movement."[53]

Subsequent work by Charles

In addition to the album's legacy as one of the most influential recordings of all time, Modern Sounds also had an effect on Charles's later work.[7] According to writer Nate Guidry, the recording marked the zenith of Charles's popularity and success.[54] By the mid-1960s and continuing into the 1970s and 1980s, the majority of his musical output was focused onto more middle of the road and pop releases, featuring less of his recognizable, trademark soul and R&B, and more of the crossover and fusion tendencies of Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music. On the album's influence, columnist Spencer Leigh of The Independent stated that "Numerous artists followed Charles's lead, but it must be said that Charles himself repeated the trick much too often."[55] The period of releases following Modern Sounds has been recognized by writers as a "critical slide" and the weakest in his recording career.[7][10][11] Several of the LP albums from this period have yet to be reissued and have remained rare among record collectors, if not out of print.[10] Charles's final studio album Genius Loves Company (2004) would later be released shortly after his death, and proved to be a comeback success, in terms of sales and critical response, as it quickly became Charles's first top-10 album in forty years and the best-selling record of his career.[56][57]

On October 27, 1998,

Concord Music.[60]

Track listing

All tracks were produced by Ray Charles and Sid Feller.

Side two
No.TitleWriter(s)Length
1."Worried Mind"Ted Daffan,
Hey, Good Lookin'
"
Hank Williams2:10

Personnel

Musicians

Additional personnel

  • Frank Abbey –
    engineering
    (tracks 1, 3, 5, 8, 10, 12)
  • Joe Adams – production (track 14)
  • Bob Arnold – engineering (track 15)
  • Hugh Bell – photography
  • Johnny Cue – engineering (track 13)
  • Todd Everett – liner notes
  • Sid Feller – production
  • Bill Inglot–
    remastering
  • Michael Ochs Archives – photography
  • Ken Perry – remastering
  • Bill Putnam – engineering (tracks 2, 4, 6, 7, 9, 11, 15)
  • Gene Thompson – engineering (tracks 1, 3, 5, 8, 10, 12)

Charts

Year Chart Peak position
1962 U.S. Pop Albums chart 1 (14 weeks)[61]
UK Albums Chart 6[62]

Singles

Year Single Peak positions[26][63]
US Hot 100 US R&B Singles
Easy Listening
UK Singles
1962 "Born to Lose" 41
"Careless Love" 60
"I Can't Stop Loving You" 1 1 1 1
"You Don't Know Me" 2 5 1 9
"—" denotes a release that did not chart.

See also

References

  1. ^
    ISBN 087930653X. Retrieved March 30, 2020 – via Google Books
    .
  2. ^ "Ray Charles 1930-2004". Keyboard. 30 (7–12): 36. 2004. Retrieved March 29, 2020 – via Google Books.
  3. ^ a b Christgau, Robert (March 29, 1983). "Christgau's Consumer Guide". The Village Voice. Retrieved December 24, 2018.
  4. ^ a b c breath of life » RAY CHARLES / “I Can’t Stop Loving You”. Kalamu. Retrieved on 2008-08-13.
  5. ^ RS Biography - Ray Charles 1930-2004. Rolling Stone. Retrieved on 2008-08-14.
  6. ^ a b Ray Charles, Bluesy Essence of Soul. The New York Times Company. Retrieved on 2008-12-12.
  7. ^ a b c d e f VH1 (2003), p. 210.
  8. ^ a b Cooper (1998), p. 13.
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h Cooper (1998), pp. 20–22.
  10. ^ a b c d e Hoard, Christian. "Review: Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music". Rolling Stone: 154–156. November 2, 2004.
  11. ^ a b c d The Rolling Stone Interview: Ray Charles. Rolling Stone. Retrieved on 2008-11-09.
  12. ^ Sharon Mawer: Album Chart History Archived 2007-07-29 at the Wayback Machine. The Official UK Charts Company. Retrieved on 2009-03-01.
  13. ^ a b c d e f Cooper (1998), pp. 14–15.
  14. ^
    Rhino Records
    . R2 70099.
  15. .
  16. ^ a b c Cooper (1998), pp. 23–25.
  17. ^ Ritz (1992), p. 214.
  18. ^ Rosen (1996), p. 1961.
  19. ^ a b c allmusic: You Don't Know Me. All Media Guide, LLC. Retrieved on 2008-09-30.
  20. ^ a b Columnist. "Review: Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music". Q: 121. November 1990.
  21. .
  22. ^ a b RIAA Searchable Database - Search Results: Ray Charles. Recording Industry Association of America. Retrieved on 2011-09-07.
  23. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Cooper (1998), pp. 29–31.
  24. ^ allmusic Modern Sounds > Charts & Awards - Billboard Singles . All Media Guide, LLC. Retrieved on 2008-08-13.
  25. ^ Columnist. RS500: 104) Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music. Rolling Stone. Retrieved on 2009-07-21.
  26. ^ .
  27. ^ a b Cooper (1998), p. 32.
  28. ^ a b Cooper (1998), p. 51.
  29. New Record Mirror. No. 72. p. 10. Archived from the original
    (PDF) on 1 April 2022. Retrieved 5 August 2022.
  30. ^ Erlewine, Stephen Thomas (n.d.). "Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music - Ray Charles". AllMusic. Retrieved March 30, 2020.
  31. ^ Sutcliffe, Phil. Review: Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music Archived 2009-09-11 at the Wayback Machine. Blender. Retrieved on 2009-07-21.
  32. ^ a b Neal, Chris. Review: Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music. Country Weekly. Retrieved on 2009-07-21.
  33. .
  34. ^ Columnist. "Review: Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music". Billboard: 22. March 17, 1962.
  35. ^ allmusic Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music Charts & Awards - Grammy Awards. All Media Guide, LLC. Retrieved on 2008-08-13.
  36. ^ Hilburn, Robert. "Review: Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music". Los Angeles Times: G13. November 23, 1976.
  37. ^ Morthland, John. (1997). Black Country Music: Crossing Country. Oxford American, issue #21, 22.
  38. ^ Grammy.com - Hall of Fame inductees. The Recording Academy. Retrieved on 2008-08-13.
  39. ^ Anon. (November 2003). "The RS 500 Greatest Albums of All Time". Rolling Stone. p. 2. Archived from the original on March 7, 2007. Retrieved March 7, 2007.
  40. ^ "500 Greatest Albums of All Time". Rolling Stone. 2012. Retrieved September 19, 2019.
  41. ^ "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time". Rolling Stone. 2020-09-22. Retrieved 2021-09-29.
  42. . Retrieved March 16, 2019 – via robertchristgau.com.
  43. ^ Costello, Elvis. "Elvis Costello's 500 Must-Have Albums, from Rap to Classical". Vanity Fair.
  44. ^ a b "Nashville Skyline: Ray Charles Should Be in Country Music Hall of Fame". CMT.com. Country Music Television. Retrieved 2008-08-13.
  45. ^ "Earache! Austin Music Blog". Austin Chronicle. Austin Chronicle Corp. Archived from the original on 2014-03-21. Retrieved 2008-09-19.
  46. ^ a b c Cooper (1998), p. 17.
  47. ^ Cooper (1998), pp. 45–50.
  48. ^ Malo (1998), p. 4. (foreword).
  49. ^ Christgau, Robert. "The Genius at Work: Ray Charles, A Critical Discography". Rolling Stone. Retrieved 2008-08-13.
  50. ^ Tyrangiel, Josh (November 2, 2006). "Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music". Time. New York. Retrieved March 15, 2013.
  51. ^ Guide Profile: Ray Charles. About.com. Retrieved on 2008-12-12.
  52. ^ The 100 Greatest Singers of All Time: 2) Ray Charles. Rolling Stone. Retrieved on 2008-12-12.
  53. ^ Soul Survivor Ray Charles. Rolling Stone. Retrieved on 2008-11-09.
  54. ^ Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Charles overcame the obstacles to become the 'Genius'. PG Publishing Co. Retrieved on 2009-03-01.
  55. ^ Sid Feller - Obituaries, News. Independent.co.uk. Retrieved on 2008-12-12.
  56. ^ 'Genius Loves Company': Charles's Parting Gift : NPR Music. NPR. Retrieved on 2008-11-08.
  57. ^ Ray Charles - Genius Loves Company. EMI Catalogue. Retrieved on 2008-11-08.
  58. ^ allmusic Complete Country & Western Recordings 1959-1986 - Overview. All Media Guide, LLC. Retrieved on 2008-08-14.
  59. ^ Cooper (1998), p. 55.
  60. About.com
    . Retrieved on 2009-06-02.
  61. ^ Billboard.com - Chart Beat Bonus - Get Ready for 'Company': Modern Sounds. Nielsen Business Media, Inc. Retrieved on 2008-08-13.
  62. ^ allmusic Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music Charts & Awards - Billboard Singles. All Media Guide, LLC. Retrieved on 2008-08-13.

Bibliography

Further reading

External links