Live In Concert

Originally released as a 12-song LP on ABC-Paramount in early 1965, Live in Concert captured Ray at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles in September 1964. More than four decades later, the CD reissue brings additional depth and perspective to the 1964 recording with the help of 24-bit remastering, seven previously unreleased tracks and extensive new liner notes that provide additional historical context to what is already considered a pivotal recording in Ray's overall body of work. "There could be no more uplifting live musical experience than digging Ray Charles and his mighty orchestra in their prime," says roots music historian Bill Dahl.

Indeed, the 15-piece orchestra backing Ray on this date - assembled just a few years earlier in 1961 - boasted no less than a dozen horns, including formidable saxophonists David "Fathead" Newman, Hank Crawford, and Leroy "Hog" Cooper, all of whom had been with Ray since his days as a leader of smaller combos. "This amazing aggregation," says Dahl, "was every bit as conversant with the intricacies of modern jazz as with the gospel-blues synthesis that Brother Ray pioneered during the mid-1950s, when he began accruing serious cred as the father of what would soon become known as soul music." In the span of 19 songs, Live in Concert illuminates the route to that destination. Ray wastes no time taking his audience on a ride from jazzy big band groove of "Swing a Little Taste" to the Latin-flavored "One Mint Julep" to the blues-gospel hybrid of his classic "I Got a Woman." Although his live rendition of "Georgia On My Mind" on this date didn't make the cut on the original LP, the song is a standout track on the reissue, thanks to his complex organ runs and the flute lines moving in counterpoint with his rich vocals.