{"id":3372,"date":"2011-08-16T00:54:17","date_gmt":"2011-08-16T07:54:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/?p=3372"},"modified":"2011-08-16T00:54:17","modified_gmt":"2011-08-16T07:54:17","slug":"ben-e-king","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/2011\/08\/ben-e-king\/","title":{"rendered":"BEN E. KING"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/h1>\n

BEN E. KING<\/h1>\n

After 50 years of R&B, a legend takes \u00a0 on the Great American Songbook<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Fifty years is a long time for a song to remain popular, but that\u2019s how long it\u2019s been since Ben E. King first sang his standard \u201cStand by Me.\u201d Today the classic\u2014written by King with the producers of his original recording, Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller\u2014is still ranked as the fourth most performed song of all time by the performing rights organization BMI. It\u2019s been in the Billboard <\/em>Top 10 twice: in 1961 and again in 1986 when it served as the title track of a smash film. It has been covered by hundreds of artists, from John Lennon and Otis Redding to the likes of author Stephen\u00a0King and boxer Muhammad Ali. \u201cI don\u2019t think anybody who writes or sings songs knows whether a song is going to have a long life or not,\u201d\u00a0says King, \u201cbut this went beyond everyone\u2019s wildest imagination. I\u2019m honored to be associated with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cStand by Me\u201d is King\u2019s most popular contribution to music history, but it\u2019s far from his only one. Born Benjamin Nelson in 1938, he first came to prominence as the lead vocalist of the Drifters on such R&B cornerstones as \u201cThere Goes My Baby,\u201d \u201cSave the Last Dance for Me\u201d and \u201cThis Magic Moment.\u201d Ejected from the group due to a conflict with its manager, King went off on his own, scoring immediately with \u201cSpanish Harlem\u201d in 1960 and kicking off a string of hits that continued well into the late 1970s.<\/p>\n

Today King has changed course, leaving behind his trademark classic R&B sound for an album of pop standards, Heart & Soul<\/em>.\u00a0\u201cYou get to a place in life where you do things that make you happy,\u201d says King, 72, \u201cand this music is not unfamiliar to me.\u201d Featuring\u00a0such oft-interpreted tunes such as \u201cI Only Have Eyes for You,\u201d \u201cMy Funny Valentine\u201d and the title track, Heart & Soul<\/em> was recorded in Calgary, Canada, and teams King with producers Lanny Williamson and Linda Nash, along with a cast of ace jazz musicians. \u201cWe\u2019re not trying to convince somebody these songs are great,\u201d says King, who grew up hearing this kind of music on the jukebox in his father\u2019s restaurant. \u201cI was singing songs like these before I made my first record. They all have longevity.\u201d King may yet record another R&B set, but for now he\u2019d like to stick with the standards. He plans to head into the studio later this year for a follow-up. \u201cI would like people to grow as I grow,\u201d he says, \u201cand love what I love.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2013Jeff Tamarkin<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BEN E. KING After 50 years of R&B, a legend takes \u00a0 on the Great American Songbook Fifty years is a long time for a song to remain popular, but that\u2019s how long it\u2019s been since Ben E. King first sang his standard \u201cStand by Me.\u201d Today the classic\u2014written by King with the producers of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[2382,2387,2383,1059,2385,2386,2384,10156,2388],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3372"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3372"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3372\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3379,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3372\/revisions\/3379"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3372"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}