Solace for the Soulless Trivia Quiz

Answer: Ray Charles

Ray Charles Robinson (1930-2004), whose trademark dark glasses were worn because he was blinded by glaucoma during his childhood, was one of the most innovative musicians of his time. He is credited with being one of the first to develop the genre that was to become known as soul, a fusion of blues, jazz, rhythm and blues, and gospel. Later in his career that broadened to include popular and country music: in 1960 'Georgia on My Mind' reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, and the 1962 album 'Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music' topped the Billboard 200.

Ray Charles and Renald Richard are credited as co-authors of the much-covered song 'I've Got a Woman' (later retitled 'I Got a Woman'), but the inspiration came from a song called 'It Must Be Jesus' by the Southern Tones, a gospel song that inspired Charles to use the energy of gospel music combined with secular lyrics to produce a fusion song. The bridge was adapted from a blues piece, 'Living on Easy Street' by Big Bill Broonzy. And hey presto, you've got soul! 'I've Got a Woman' was recorded in November of 1954, and hit the top of the R&B chart in January of 1955.

Answer: Little Richard

Richard Wayne Penniman (1932-2020) was a force in American music for over half a century, with a dynamic style that appealed to a wide range of audiences - rock and roll, soul, rhythm & blues and funk all claim him as a major contributor. The 1955 single 'Tutti Frutti' became one of his signature pieces, with its frenetic piano playing and nearly-shouted vocal performance. (The original lyrics are not suitable for this site - it was cleaned up significantly for commercial recording by turning most of the lyrics into nonsense syllables!)

The 1956 single 'Long Tall Sally', written by Little Richard with Robert "Bumps" Blackwell and Enotris Johnson, was the first of fifteen Little Richard songs to hit the top of the Billboard Rhythm and Blues Best-Sellers in the space of three years. It also made the top ten on the pop chart. Many people will have first heard the song via one of the (literally hundreds of) cover versions, such as those from Elvis Presley and the Beatles, both big fans of Little Richard. The Beatles featured 'Long Tall Sally', with Paul McCartney on vocals, starting from their Quarrymen years, and including it in their last concert in 1966.

Answer: Solomon Burke

James Solomon MacDonald was born in either 1936 or 1940, and had his name changed to Solomon Vincent McDonald Burke when his mother married Vincent Burke. As a child, he was deemed the spiritual head of the church his grandmother had established following a dream about ten years before his birth, and he became a preacher of some renown in the Philadelphia area. As a teenager, he discovered a passion for music, and became a gospel performer. His career had a shaky start, but after he signed with Atlantic in 1960 and (having refused to be marketed as a rhythm and blues singer due to the profane nature of that genre) coined the term soul singer to describe his musical style, things really looked up. In 1963 he was decreed the King of Rock 'n' Soul, in a ceremony dreamed up by a Baltimore radio personality. He then became known for wearing full regalia: a replica of the United Kingdom Crown Jewels, and a fifteen-foot long cape (which at times was used to conceal a small person as Burke came onto the stage, who would then leave the stage after the cape had been dramatically thrown off - making it seem to depart of its own accord). Following the end of his performance career, he returned to his work as a preacher until his death in 2010.

Burke's second single for Atlantic, recorded in 1961, was a cover of a country song written by Virgil "Pappy" Stewart, and originally released by his band in 1951. 'Just Out of Reach' is the short form of its title, the full title being variously given as 'Just Out of Reach (of My Two Open Arms)' or 'Just Out of Reach (of My Two Empty Arms)'. It was his first hit, selling over a million copies and charting on both the R&B and pop charts. Interestingly, its popularity in the southern states of America led to a number of bookings for Burke to perform in areas where his race was an issue that the promoters hadn't considered, as they assumed the race from the country feel. He was even booked to perform in front of Ku Klux Klan festivities, which led to some difficult situations.

Answer: Sam Cooke

Samuel Cook (1931-1964) is commonly called the King of Soul, both because his music influenced the developing genre, and because he helped bring it to the attention of a new audience, with 29 of his songs making the Billboard Pop Singles Top 40. His career lasted a mere eight years, before he was controversially shot by a motel manager in an incident officially ruled to be justifiable homicide. Sam Cooke wrote and originally recorded a number of songs that may be more familiar from their many cover versions, including 'You Send Me', 'Wonderful World' and 'Another Saturday Night'.

The 1962 song 'Bring it on Home to Me' marked the start of Sam Cooke's move from popular music to material with more substance. It was based on a 1959 gospel song called 'I Want to Go Home', reworked to keep a gospel feel but with a secular tone. "Bring it to me, bring your sweet lovin', bring it on home to me" is hardly a lyric appropriate for a church service. Cooke also kept the call-and-response pattern of the original song, with the final take having Lou Rawls as the response singer.

Although not in the soul genre (and hence not the song I chose to use in the quiz), 'A Change is Gonna Come' (apparently inspired by listening to Bob Dylan's 'Blowin' in the Wind' shortly after Cooke's band had been turned away from a Louisiana motel due to their colour) is widely regarded as Sam Cooke's most important work, and became an anthem for the civil rights movement during the 1960s. He performed it live only once - in a performance on 'The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson' - a performance whose tape was not preserved. His decision not to perform it live was both because of the complexity of the arrangement, and because of the dark feel of the song. The recording was released two weeks after his death.

Answer: James Brown

James Joseph Brown (1933-2006) was involved in the development of several musical genres in a career that spanned over 50 years. He started as a gospel singer, reached popularity as a rhythm and blues performer, transitioned to soul music, whereby he gained the nickname Godfather of Soul and Mr Dynamite, before moving on to develop funk. James Brown was one of the first ten people inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986, and in the first group of members of the Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame in 2013. The list of awards recognising his contributions is much too long to include here!

'Papa's Got a Brand New Bag' is one of James Brown's signature songs, with its innovative use of dramatic emphasis on the first beat of each bar perfectly suited to Brown's high-energy performances. It was released as a single in 1965, becoming his first song to reach the Billboard Hot 100 and making it to the top of the R&B charts, before earning Brown's first Grammy Award, for Best Rhythm & Blues Recording.

Answer: Wilson Pickett

Wilson Pickett (1941-2006) was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991, in large part based on his contributions to the development of soul music both as a writer and as a performer. Like many other musicians in this quiz, he began as a singer of gospel music for church choirs, and performed as a gospel singer before deciding that there was more money to be made in secular music than in religious music. He joined the Falcons, a group trying to secularise gospel, and from there launched into a solo career. One of his early hits was 'Land of a Thousand Dances', a cover of Chris Kenner's 1962 release which featured the names of a number of then-popular dances; do you remember how to dance the pony, the mashed potato, the twist, the jerk and the watusi?

'In the Midnight Hour', written by Wilson Pickett and Steve Cropper, was recorded in 1965 in Memphis. (The pair wrote it while working in the Lorraine Motel, where Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated three years later.) The title was inspired by a line from a Falcons song, 'I Found a Love': "And sometimes I call in the midnight hour!" It was successful on both the R&B and pop charts, as (you may have noticed) was often the case for popular soul songs.

Answer: Stevie Wonder

Stevland Hardaway Judkins was born prematurely in 1950, and suffered from retinopathy of prematurity (detached retinas), leaving him blind. His mother (who had a seemingly complicated romantic life) renamed him to Morris after divorcing his father, and the singer kept that as his legal name. He was a gifted musician and singer as a child, and started performing professionally at the age of 11, when he was signed to a Motown label with the nickname Little Stevie Wonder. At 13, he became the youngest artist to have a song on top of the Billboard Hot 100, with 'Fingertips', which was at the same time on top of the R&B charts. When his voice changed, he dropped the Little, becoming known as Stevie Wonder for the rest of this lengthy career - he released two singles in 2020, including 'Can't Put it in the Hands of Fate', a funk song featuring rappers Busta Rhymes, Chika, Cordae and Rapsody which he described as "a response to systemic racism."

The 1966 song 'Uptight' was the first recorded as Stevie Wonder. He co-wrote it with Sylvia Moy and Henry Cosby, with whom he worked through most of the 1960s. It reached number three on the Billboard Pop singles chart, and number one on the R&B singles chart. The song earned his first of many Grammy Award nominations (for Best R&B Song and Best R&B Performance), although he did not win either.

Answer: Percy Sledge

Percy Tyrone Sledge (1940-2015) found his niche, the soul ballad, with his first release, 'When a Man Loves a Woman'. The origins of the song are a bit murky. The songwriting credits are given to Calvin Lewis and Andrew Wright, members of the band with whom Percy Sledge was singing at the time, but Sledge believed he should have been given co-authoring credit because he was responsible for the original concept.

The single was produced by Quin Ivy at the Norala Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, but is said to have been first recorded at the nearby FAME Studios, owned by Rick Hall, who arranged the distribution deal with Atlantic.

Then there was a mixup, and the tapes from a session in which the horns were out of tune got released instead of the "fixed" recording.

The song still managed to make it to the top of both the Billboard Hot 100 and the R&B Singles chart.

Answer: Otis Redding

Otis Ray Redding Jr. (1941-1967) had a massive impact on the soul scene, which would have been even more significant had he not died in a plane crash at the age of 26. In 1958, he won first prize ($5) in a local talent quest fifteen weeks in a row, and met Johnny Jenkins, who invited Redding to join his group as a singer and driver (since Jenkins did not have a license). It was during a 1962 recording session at the Stax studio that Jenkins had booked more time then he needed; Redding took advantage of this to record a little song of his own, 'These Arms of Mine', which led to a contract and his first single. It was reasonably successful, selling more than 800,000 copies, but not one of the songs for which he is best remembered. These include 'Respect', 'Try a Little Tenderness' and, of course, '(Sittin' on) The Dock of the Bay'.

Otis Redding started writing '(Sittin' on) The Dock of the Bay' while on a houseboat in Sausalito, California; it was finished in Memphis with the cooperation of Steve Cropper, guitarist for Booker T. & the M.G.'s, who had been Redding's backing band for his performance at the Monterey Festival. The song was recorded twice in November and December of 1967 (and still considered unfinished), before Redding returned to the concert tour from which he never returned. Cropper did the final mix, incorporating sounds that Redding had planned such as seagulls and waves breaking on the shore. Released in 1968, it became the first posthumous Number One on the Billboard Hot 100. It topped the R&B chart for four weeks, and performed well internationally, with global sales of over four million copies. It received two Grammy Awards in 1969: Best R&B Song and Best Male R&B Vocal Performance.

Answer: Aretha Franklin

Aretha Louise Franklin (1942-2018), the only female to make her way into this quiz, was widely acclaimed as the Queen of Soul. After a start singing gospel at the Detroit church where her father was a pastor, she signed with Columbia Records to start a secular music career. It didn't really take off until she moved to Atlantic Records in 1966. In 1967 she recorded 'I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)', which made Number One on the R&B chart, and Number Nine on the pop chart. That recording session marked her transition from singer to piano-playing singer - as soon as she started playing, the pianist who had been hired for the session moved over to use the electric piano. Subsequent hits included Carole King's '(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman'; Don Covay's 'Chain of Fools', originally written for Otis Redding, but given to Aretha by producer Jerry Wexler; 'Think', written by Aretha and her husband at the time, Ted White; 'I Say a Little Prayer', a cover of the Dionne Warwick hit written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David; and, of course, 'Respect', a cover of a song by Otis Redding.

While Otis Redding wrote and originally released 'Respect' with considerable success, Aretha rearranged it to produce a feminist (and civil rights) anthem that became her signature song. As well as modifying the lyrics to fit the gender reversal, Aretha added the upbeat refrain "R-E-S-P-E-C-T Find out what it means to me" (which Otis subsequently included in his concert performances of the song). The song earned two Grammy Awards in 1968, for Best Rhythm and Blues Recording and for Best Rhythm and Blues Solo Vocal Performance, Female.