The August nights cannot be compared with any other - nature, exhausted by a jerk to the sun, slowly fills with inner gold, heavy bronze of the coming autumn.

The earth gives off midday heat, and as soon as it gets dark, the air is dominated by the aromas of flowers and herbs, honey and the dark fruits of the night.

Closer to the ground - a mushroom spirit, wormwood and needles, flickering and incessant singing.

Until the rains and cold weather, oh how far, summer, slowly cooling down in a hot crucible of time, gradually lets go of unprecedentedly long days to rest, and the prophetic twilight is getting closer to us, we feel the breath of life more and more sharply, so measured - nothing can be stopped, so fleeting - you can't hold it with your hands.

We are tormented by love and sleep among the stars, we ourselves flicker, sing and fall into eternity.

We live, and we are alive, and we want something special, which has never happened before.

What will never happen again, what will never happen again ...

We feel the distant - white and snowy - shores.

It breaks us down, makes us involuntarily touch our eyes - something horrible, but ah ... - not a speck ...

And how can we not remember the simple wisdom of Bradbury: “August should be sieved slowly, like pear liqueur.

Pour into a small glass, sip a drop, and look at the sun through a glass ... August nights should be diluted with candle lights, milk poured into a bowl for a brownie, the purr of a cat and the chirping of grasshoppers.

August days should be laid between the pages of books, like bookmarks, in order to shake out their heat later, in chilly November taking this book from the shelf ... And I conjure you, well, do not yell at all corners: “Oh, here is August, here is autumn ... "Well, where are you in a hurry?

Stop the clock.

Drink drop by drop ... "

We are fascinated and betrothed to the month of Caesarean.

We are hungry for love.

And music.

And you can't go wrong with her.

The most touching thing often (and maybe always) happens at the beginning: after all, nothing is clear and no matter what you do - a boat made of birch bark, a song from the heart - it turns out better than good.

There is such a story in music - when a few albums, a few old, with a scratch, vinyls are hooked for a lifetime, decide almost everything.

They help to overcome both that invisible speck in the eyes, and the strangely disturbing knowledge of the inevitability of being - everything fades, having evaporated in full force, everything is reborn, re-emerging from nothing.

In order for such albums to appear, someone whose voice is recorded on them must step into the inferno more than once or twice, and then leave there with a charming smile and, sitting at the piano, bending down to the microphone, do something like this - not to repeat to anyone, it seems for a dream from childhood, the taste of mint, raspberries ...

This is how the present works ...

Long ago, in February 1949, 19-year-old (and already badly beaten by life) Ray Charles first appeared in the Los Angeles studio of a little-known record company Down Beat Swing Records (founded in 1947 by Jack Lauderdale) - nothing special, one among many.

The three of us recorded: Ray as pianist and vocalist and studio musicians The Maksin Trio - bass and guitar.

The very first - and, in my feeling, they became a window from a modest office of a small, in the distant childhood of an invented house among flowers and trees right into the hearts of millions - and forever were I love you, I love you (I will never let you go ) and Confession blues.

The darkness of an unpretentious studio, a barrel sound, an echo echoing with itself, cigar smoke, a strong temporal train, fog and chill - there, outside the window, away from sorrow! ..

People at the tables, silence - and no one at all.

A lonely candle slightly swayed by the wind, a glass of tart red, a leisurely conversation with someone who does not need to explain too much, kindness and benevolence to those like yourself.

You are in the midst of the Summer of the Almighty.

Colds and anxieties are powerless here.

The walls are secure.

Music floats away in a fragile boat along the glare of running water.

And you float away with her.

And you are no longer there.

And there is only what people, not being able to find the right words, invariably and in a hurry call happiness.

Next session of 1949.

With a slightly changed composition of musicians and name, it is now Maksim Trio.

And incredible stories about a man wandering through the streets and memories to his past and present himself, about love and loyalty, even though our life on earth is a short moment.

About something that squeezes the heart with both sweet sadness and sugary-bitter, based on the experience of years, persistent hope - Alone in this City, Let's have a Ball, Rockin 'Chair Blues (named after a tiny cafe in which Charles sang faithfully a million times) , Can't You see Darling.

Fifteen songs recorded in 1949.

Fourteen in 1950.

Six

-

in 1951 and six more 

- in 1952.

This is where the story of Ray Charles at Down Beat Swing Records ends, and the company itself will cease to exist a little over a year later.

And Ray, caught up in the whirlwind of time and the talent of Ahmet Ertegun, flying over his former life, over troubles and hardships washed away by the southern rains, will land safely in Atlantic Records, where his greatest hits will be shown to the world, where the absolutely impossible will be a mixture of jazz and country , blues and spiritual chants.

Where Ray will become a guide among the worlds - from black to white, from white to black.

And who is this Ahmet Ertegun?

O!

Just an educated Turkish youth, the son of the Turkish Ambassador to the United States, a big lover of American folk music (what else would you call it?), Co-founder (in 1947, together with Herb Abramson) of the Atlantic Records label, inspirer and creator of the Rock and n 'Hall of Fame -roll.

In a word, the most ordinary person in his place.

It is he, under the pseudonym Negetre (almost Ertegun, on the contrary), who will write several iconic, star-breakthrough hits.

One of them is Mess Around, which paved the way for Charles to the unattainable rock and roll heaven.

Ah you can talk about the pit, barbecue

The band was jumpin, 'the people too

Ah mess around, they doin 'the Mess Around

They doin 'the mess around

Everybody doin 'the mess around !!!

Let's go back to the beginning.

Like Sun records for Elvis, for Ray, Down Beat Swing Records will be the fulcrum from which to turn the world.

Tablets of rock.

The inscriptions are difficult to read.

Many letters have been erased.

You will not find accompanists right away, and there is nothing to say about the studio masters.

But the recordings of November 1950 reveal (who do you think?) Oscar Moore himself, the son of a blacksmith from Texas (how did they manage it?), The famous jazz guitarist from the Nat King Cole trio: Baby Let Me Hold Your Hand - with what- then the prohibitively beautiful guitar solo of Oscar and Ray's voice (except for a piano playing an unknown instrument, most likely a vibraphone or a glockenspiel), making you believe in princesses and unicorns, and even in the everyday wonders of meeting with the one that you saw only in dreams.

Baby let me hold your hand

Until I make you understand

Ohh, baby, baby let me hold your hand

I really believe, everything will sure be grand ...

- Baby, I'll buy you a diamond ring

Cadillac and everything

Then baby, I'm gonna buy you a house in style

Then I'll live there forever

Yes Lord with my little wife and child! ..

The most common reprints of early Ray Charles are called Birth of a Legend 1949-1952.

However, it doesn't really matter, 41 tracks are available everywhere.

Another thing is that sometimes what was at the beginning of the beginnings is lost, melts in time, gradually dissolving, merging with our air and our breath, turning into almost nothing, into scraps of meanings and phrases.

Are you still here reading?

It's time to listen.

Happy August to you.

After all, you can never compare with anything the dark, dream-cool nights of a sunset summer.

Everything is near.

Just reach out your hand.

Can't you see.

darling? ..

- The angels sing when you smile at me

The tropic moves sides of ships at sea

But doesn't matter if my thoughts are free

Cant you see what you're doing to me ...

- The honeybee makes a sigh at me

The birds above sing a song of love

Though I have cried constantly

That's not the thing to do ...

- This feeling has me dangling on a string

With no escape seemingly

Though I have thoughts with myself that I'm lost

So let it be ...

- Let my favorite cloud

Pass over me

Forget about

The past with glee

So if you smile real soon

I'll hear angels singing

A tune

Can't you see darlin 'what you're doing to me? ..

The point of view of the author may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.