Biography

Together with Julia Rinker Miller, sang the theme song of the television series Three's Company (1976) ("Come and Knock on Our Door").

Born Charles Raymond Offenberg in Chicago on September 13, 1918, Charles won a radio singing contest at 13 and had his own 15-minute program by 16. He went on to study at Chicago Musical College and Central YMCA College. He moved to New York in 1942 and began working in radio. Although he had been calling himself Ray Charles (an inversion of the name of a famous silent movie idol, Charles Ray) since high school, he did not legally change his name until 1944.

Director of The Ray Charles Singers.

Ray Charles' name often caused confusion despite obvious differences from the black, blind soul singer. Once during the Reagan administration, the white Charles was invited to join the line of Kennedy Center Honors guests allowed to meet the president. When Reagan was handed a card with Charles' name on it, he did a double-take and quipped, "I didn't know you came in two colors." In a 1986 Muppets special, which featured the black Charles in archival footage, the music credits make a teasing reference to the identity confusion, calling the choral director-composer "The Other Ray Charles." Charles met the other Ray on a TV assignment and persuaded him to sing "America the Beautiful" on the Glenn Campbell show, more than a decade before the soul icon's stirring rendition of the song at the 1984 Republican National Convention.

Composer, conductor, songwriter and arranger, and the director of the Ray Charles Singers. He joined ASCAP in 1954, and has made many records.