Gone home

Lou Rawls, a great solo singer, has left the earthly plane. One of the obituaries answered a question I had always wondered about and never been able to answer: Lou Rawls was the person singing harmony behind Sam Cooke on Bring It On Home to Me. My other greats, without thinking too much about it, are Smokey Robinson, Chuck Jackson (I Don't Want to Cry, Any Day Now, Since I Don't Have You, and so many more), Bobby "Blue" Bland (too many to mention, but especially his version of Dark End of the Street, plus Farther up the Road and I Pity the Fool), Sam Cooke, Brook Benton, and Jerry Butler. And I'm not forgetting Solomon Burke or the voice of Chuck Berry or the softer side of James Brown or any of the dulcet voices in the Motown and other groups. This is about the sweet voices of the slow song.