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Tampa Bay was home turf

Ray Charles is remembered by Tampa Bay residents as a genius who remembered them after achieving fame.

It's been more than half a century since Ray Charles lived in the Tampa Bay area, but people he knew back then haven't forgotten him. That's because, they say, he didn't forget them.

The late Manzy Harris was Charles' friend and fellow musician in Tampa during the mid 1940s. Back then, the future legend was a 16-year-old piano player eking out a living playing with any band that would hire him, at clubs like the Manhattan Casino in St. Petersburg and the Blue Room and the Cotton Club in Tampa. One of the first bands he played with was Harris'.

Elsie McGarrah of St. Petersburg was a singer with the Manzy Harris Orchestra in the 1950s and '60s. She and Charles never shared a stage, but she knows about his loyalty to Harris. "He never forgot Manzy," she says.

Charles, by then a legend himself, played a concert here when Harris was almost 90. "He had Manzy measured for the tux suit," McGarrah says. "He sent the limousine for him. He said, "I want you on stage with me.' I can still hear the tears in Manzy's voice."

Charles first landed in Tampa in about 1946, after his mother's death. He left the Florida School for the Deaf and Blind in St. Augustine and began working around the state as a musician.

Tampa was "a mecca for top-line musicians" in those days, says Ernie Calhoun. Calhoun, tenor saxophonist for Al Downing and the All Stars and other bands, worked with Charles in the Manzy Harris Orchestra and later in Charlie Brantley and the Honeydippers.

"We were all in our learning process," he says. "Ray would come to my house, and we would study harmony, theory, composition. We were doing what they called woodshedding.

"Ray was a genius. I was just a student."

Calhoun remembers that R.C., as he was called then, didn't like people to think of him as blind. He was living in a hotel on Central Avenue in Tampa and would walk each day to rehearsal at the Blue Room nightclub.

"He would put his foot on the center line of the sidewalk and never get off it, just follow it along. I used to marvel at how he could do that."

Charles also would hum under his breath, which baffled Calhoun until he realized it created an echo off nearby objects, helping Charles to navigate. "He would come up on you and say, "Get out of my way, man.' "

Calhoun recalls Charles pedaling a bicycle along Central Avenue with musician Harold Young on the handlebars. "They turn the corner and Harold yells, "Watch out for that car!'

"Ray says, "I see that car, man. You think I want to kill both of us?' "

Charles' death, he says, is "a loss to the nation, a loss to the music world."

Though Charles sometimes had a temper, Calhoun says, "I adored him as a person. He was very free-hearted."

Trombonist Buster Cooper of St. Petersburg came up in the local music scene, too, before going on to play with Lionel Hampton, Benny Goodman and Duke Ellington.

"Ray and I were teenagers at the same time," he said. They never worked together, but Cooper remembers Charles' focus even then: "He knew what he wanted, and he got it."

Years later, when Cooper tired of the road, he moved to Los Angeles to do session work. "Ray called me to join his band (on the road), but I turned him down," he says. "Imagine that. But if I wanted to go back on the road, I could have been back with Duke."

Charles left the Tampa Bay area after about three years, bound for Seattle and a meeting with Quincy Jones that would propel him to stardom. But he retained many ties; his daughter Evelyn lives in Tampa, as do some other family members. In 1990, the University of South Florida awarded him an honorary doctorate in fine arts.

And he left those top line musicians with clear memories. "All I can do is just give him the highest praise," Cooper says. "He was a professional's professional."

- Times researcher Kitty Bennett contributed to this report. Colette Bancroft can be reached at bancroft@sptimes.com or 727 893-8435.

After his mother died when he was 15, Ray Charles started playing gigs anywhere he could in Florida cities including Tampa and St. Petersburg. In this autobiography on his Web site (www.raycharles.com) he described how after three years of struggling, he left for Seattle.

"Eventually, I got tired of Florida . . . I said to myself, I'm going to leave here because I'm not going anywhere, I'm not doing anything. I was too scared to go to a big city like New York or Chicago, but I wanted to go to a city that was a nice size and where I thought I wouldn't get swallowed up. So I said to a friend, Gosady McGee, "I want to go to a city . . . what would be the furthest city I could get to from Florida that's still a city.' And that's how I wound up in Seattle. I saved what little money I could - about $500 - and finally took a bus from Tampa, Florida, to Seattle, Washington. The trip took me 5 days."

1949: Makes first single, Confession Blues, in Seattle credited to the Maxin Trio.

1951: First top 10 R&B hit: Baby Let Me Hold Your Hand

1954: I Got a Woman

1959: First top 10 pop hit: What'd I Say

1960: Georgia on My Mind wins him first of a dozen Grammy awards

1961: Hit the Road Jack

1962: I Can't Stop Loving You and You Don't Know Me

1963: Busted

1966: Cryin' Time

1978: Autobiography, Brother Ray, is a bestseller

1979: His version of Georgia on My Mind is named Georgia's official state song

1980: Charles is featured in the movie, The Blues Brothers

1983: Friendship, an album of duets with 10 country stars, including George Jones and Willie Nelson, reaches country Top 10.

1984: Sings America the Beautiful at the Republican National Convention

1986: Among first inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame; is a Kennedy Center Honors recipient

1988: Wins Lifetime Achievement Award at the Grammys.

1993: Wins final Grammy, for A Song for You.

2001: Sings America the Beautiful at Super Bowl XXXV at Raymond James Stadium

2004: His last CD, a series of duets with musicians including Elton John, is due out in August. A feature film, Brother Ray, starring Jamie Foxx, is tentatively scheduled for release in October.

- Sources: Times wires, raycharles.com, allmusic.com