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John Alvin Ray (January 10, 1927 – February 24, 1990) was an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Highly popular for most of the 1950s, Ray has been cited by critics as a major precursor to what became rock and roll, for his jazz and blues -influenced music, and his animated stage personality. [1] .
- Cry
Johnnie Ray recorded the song at Columbia's 30th Street...
- Hopewell
Hopewell is an unincorporated community in Yamhill County,...
- Just Walkin
However, the best-known version of the song was recorded by...
- Cry
Feb 25, 1990 · Johnnie Ray, the balladeer of tears who brought an emotional intensity to music that was singular to his era, died Saturday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.
- Early years
- Musical career
- Film
- Later career
- Live performances
- Controversy
- Legacy
- Marriage
- Death
One of the greatest of the transition singers between the crooners and the rockers, Johnnie Ray was the only son of Elmer and Hazel Ray. He was born and raised in Oregon where he loved hiking in nature. He was close with his older sister, sometimes hiking with her. Mother nature eventually would inspire the song lyrics he wrote. After he became fam...
Ray's early songs, such as the 1952 45 RPM record, \"Cry\" / \"The Little White Cloud That Cried,\" were major successes. Following up on that hit single, later the same year (1952) Ray had a #4 United States hit with a cover of the 1930 standard \"Walkin' My Baby Back Home.\" In 1954, he covered The Drifters' R & B hit \"Such A Night.\" Ray's vers...
In 1954, Johnnie Ray co-starred alongside Marilyn Monroe, Donald O'Connor, Dan Dailey, Mitzi Gaynor and Ethel Merman in the 20th Century Fox movie musical There's No Business Like Show Business. Monroe's hatred of the movie was widely publicized, and it was a disappointment at the box office and with critics. After Monroe's premature death, There's...
His cover of \"Just Walkin' In The Rain,\" which had been composed years earlier by two incarcerated men, rose to #2 on the American charts in December 1956. His last major hit song in the United States came in 1957: \"You Don't Owe Me A Thing.\" His recordings reached many more people in the United Kingdom than in the United States for the next fo...
In 1987, Ray performed in the relatively small auditorium at El Camino College in Torrance, California, a far cry from the nearby Hollywood Bowl where he had performed on August 27, 1955. Even that far back, according to a Los Angeles Times display ad for the Hollywood Bowl that can be found in the newspaper's August 23 edition in its database, Joh...
Johnnie Ray's brushes with the law during two visits to Detroit (1951 and 1959) resulted from a sting operation that police officers throughout the United States routinely did to apprehend promiscuous gay men. In the aftermath of the 1951 arrest, Ray pled guilty and paid a fine. He was acquitted of the 1959 charge. Some writers have said Ray's trou...
Other music historians have cited an equally important factor in Ray's fade from public view: an operation he underwent in New York in 1958 that he and his surgeon hoped would restore his hearing. The surgeon botched the procedure and his hearing worsened, thereby making it much harder for him to communicate with musicians who backed him and with r...
During his heyday, Johnnie Ray had had to endure a marriage to a Los Angeles woman named Marilyn Morrison. Influential newspaper columnists such as Louella Parsons wrote about the couple many times between 1952 and 1954 as they frequently separated and reconciled, or so the columnists claimed. A biographer speculated decades later that music busine...
Very soon after returning from Oregon, which he said was his actual home, to Los Angeles, where he lived out of necessity, he began showing symptoms of cirrhosis of the liver. His overseas fans didn't have access to this information. The American media now included many more entertainment news outlets than it had in the era when Louella Parsons and...
- January 10, 1927
- February 24, 1990
Learn about Johnnie Ray, the Oregon-born singer who was a pioneer of rock and roll and a controversial figure in the 1950s. Discover his musical achievements, personal struggles, and legacy in this comprehensive article.
Oct 25, 2022 · Learn about the life and legacy of Johnnie Ray, a hard of hearing farm boy who became a teen idol and influenced Elvis Presley. Watch the documentary on OPB TV or online.
- Elizabeth Castillo
Oct 11, 2022 · Oregon musician Johnnie Ray was once arguably the biggest pop star in the world. In the early 1950s, his unique sound, coupled with his emotional performances, thrilled audiences and helped...
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Feb 25, 1990 · Johnnie Ray, a singer whose emotionally uninhibited hit recordings in the early 1950's anticipated the rock-and-roll era, died of liver failure yesterday in Los Angeles. He was 63 years old.
