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ngwriters Hall of Fame Lifetime Achievement Award. Two years later he is awarded another Lifetime Achievement Award at the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. In 1994 he wins his 12th Grammy Award.

In the last ten years of his life he spends about eight months of the year performing at various places. He receives countless more awards in recognition of his contribution to music. He even performs for Ronald Regan at the White House which he felt was one of the brightest moments in his life.

In 2004, Ray Charles worked extensively with Jamie Fox to create the movie called Ray. The movie focuses on the 30 years of his life where he goes from one label to the next and goes from one genre to the next and masterfully blends them together. They cover the ups and downs of his life, particularly his addiction to heroin and particularly how Ray Charles felt about his own addiction. One element that the movie touches on that this essay has not yet is his romantic life. In the movie, he has a wife and a romantic interest, but he actually had two wives over the same period and had quite a few additional love interests that produces at least twelve children. A self proclaimed ladies man and junkie who did drugs because it was his pleasure to do so does not quite fit what one would assume to be a recipe for major lifetime success on the level that Ray Charles has enjoyed. And while because of the racial inequalities during the period when he performed he earned significantly less than most other white performers. What is most ironic is that today, with so many popular artists going bankrupt and having to sell off homes and getting high dollar items repossessed, with all of that and him getting payed less, he still enjoyed an extremely comfortable lifestyle and more importantly as a testament to what kind of business man he was, he owned everything he had. He was not like the artists today that rent or lease multiple planes, no, he had a jet and he owned it outright. His houses and cars all paid for. All of his kids were taken care of and on top of that each one of his kids were given a one million dollar check and Ray Charles paid the taxes off each of the kids on top of that. Unlike many others, he had such a crystal clear grasp of things, which is hard to fathom given how artists live today and the drugs he was taking.

June 10, 2004 Ray Charles Robinson passed away from liver cancer. He knew he was going to die soon yet his passion kept him strong. During the last years he continued his singing, and writing and recording. He was set to make an appearance at the grand opening of the movie Ray in a few months. He had an album that he was working on that was a compilation of duets with B.B. King, Van Morrison and his life long friend Willie Nelson amongst many others. They, and many many others came to pay final respects for the real 'father of soul'. And I as well, as somebody who never before listened to his music, have over the course of researching Ray Charles and his music come to respect and admire the works of Brother Ray.