A Legend Snatched from our Midsts

Ray Charles passed away today and it is with extreme sadness that I write this.

A big regret I will forever live with, and have beat myself up over, was the fact that I missed a show of his in July 2001. I was in Copenhagen, Denmark during Jazz Fest. The famous Tivoli Gardens was a site where the big names were playing. I think it was July 6th that I saw Wayne Shorter play a magnificent show at Tivoli. the next night Ray Charles was slated to perform but I absolutely had to catch a plane to London or risk getting stuck in Europe with three maxed out credit cards, no cash, and no clean socks. I kicked myself for not trying hard enough to stay, and I still deeply regret it.

There have been no better versions of America the Beautiful or Georgia on my Mind. America the Beautiful, at least Charles' version, is the only song in the world that makes me feel THAT patriotic. Ray Charles is the epitamy of musicianship and this poor elegy does no justice for such an incomparable human.