James Ingram: Grammy winner, giant of soul music
Music is an important part of my life, but it’s not all of my life. My family is my life
● James Ingram, the American singer who has died of brain cancer aged 66, was one of the biggest names in R&B music in the 1980s, scoring hits such as Baby, Come to Me and Yah Mo B There, and collaborating with artists including Michael Jackson, Linda
Ronstadt and Dolly Parton.
His success came as a surprise to him because during the late 1970s he had established a reputation in Los Angeles as a session musician. Ingram played drums for Ray Charles, and in Dick Clark’s band, and had been the keyboard player in his own funk group.
He had, however, sung backing vocals for Marvin Gaye and had recorded a demo of a song called Just Once that found its way to the musician and producer Quincy Jones. Jones rang to ask him to come into the studio, but Ingram, not thinking of himself as a singer in his own right, assumed it was a prank and hung up. Fortunately, his wife had heard Jones’s voice and convinced him to call back.
Ingram featured on two tracks on Jones’s LP The Dude (1981) that went on to earn a dozen Grammy nominations. When Ingram opened the television coverage of the awards ceremony with One Hundred Ways, it was the first time he had sung live. He also became the first artist to win a Grammy (for Just Once) without having released an album of his own. Nor could he read music, but Jones advised him not to learn, saying it would cramp his natural style.
Christian faith
The following year, Ingram reached No 1 in the US (and No 11 in the UK) with Baby, Come to Me, a duet with Patti Austin which showcased his smooth, sincere vocal style.
He would come to be bracketed with the likes of Luther Vandross, marketed as part of the “quiet storm” trend in soul music, but there was always something purer to his sound than that of his contemporaries.
Certainly, seduction was largely absent from it, his Christian faith (and long marriage) being central to his way of life.
Though the first of his five solo LPs, It’s Your Night (1983), would sell one million copies, Ingram achieved prominence with singles.
In 1984, he recorded Yah Mo B There — a hymn of praise to God (Yahweh) — with Michael McDonald. It was the track most played on US radio that year, brought him his second Grammy, and reached the top 20 on both sides of the Atlantic.
He remained close to Jones, who featured him in 1985 on We Are the World, the American counterpart to Band Aid’s Do They Know It’s Christmas?. The pair also co-wrote the song PYT (Pretty Young Thing) for Michael Jackson’s Thriller album.
‘Man, you’re killing it’
Ingram remained in awe of Jackson’s talents. Most singers are afraid of making any noise which might interfere with the recording. “Michael was dancing while he was singing. I’m not talking about just moving a little bit, he came out and he was sweating. ‘Am I singing it right?’ I said: ‘Man, you’re killing it.’ But I never seen nothing like that in my life, ever. Michael, he’s not from this planet, man.”
In the late 1980s, Ingram began to be heard frequently on film soundtracks, including that for The Color Purple. Somewhere Out There, which he recorded with Ronstadt for Steven Spielberg’s animated movie An American Tail, reached No 2 in the US and No 8 in Britain in 1986. He also recorded duets with, among others, Anita Baker and Parton.
Ingram claimed the No 1 spot again on the Hot 100 in 1990, with the ballad I Don’t Have the Heart.
It never charted in the UK, however, and was to prove to be his last hit of note, though in 2008, after a 15-year gap between records, he released the album Stand (in the Light), which reached the top 20 of the US gospel charts.
James Edward Ingram was born on February 16 1952 and grew up in Akron, Ohio.
His parents, Henry, who later worked at Ford Motors, and Alistine, had six children.
The family would attend church (where Henry was a deacon) three times a week, as well as Sunday school, exposing James to music while still young.
“To keep my mother from pinching me when I was talking, I joined up in the choir,” he recalled. “But I never did a solo.” Instead, he was drawn to instruments.
His older brother, Henry, was a talented musician but grew irked at James’s repeated demands to show him how to play the piano.
So he eventually taught himself, figuring out the chords of Stevie Wonder’s Ma Cherie Amour which he had heard on the radio.
Jimmy Smith, who popularised the Hammond organ, was another early idol.
In time, Ingram learnt to play the drums, guitar, bass and synthesiser as well.
He was a talented athlete at East High School but turned down a sports scholarship to university to concentrate on music. After a spell on the assembly line at Ford, earning money to pay for equipment, he moved to Los Angeles in 1973 with the band Revelation Funk.
He stayed in the city when, after several years trying to make their names, the others returned home.
“Music is an important part of my life, but it’s not all of my life,” Ingram affirmed. “My family is my life. I never confuse what I am with what I do.”
He had been married since 1975 to Debra Robinson, who survives him with their six children.