While remaining in Los Angeles, Charles continued a light work load at his studios and offices, overseeing production of new releases for his own record label, Crossover Records, mixing a long-planned gospel CD and beginning work on the duets album.
A feature film based on his life story, "Unchain My Heart, The Ray Charles Story," starring Jamie Foxx as the entertainer, completed principal filming early last summer.
Charles' last public performance of his career was on July 20, 2003, in Alexandria, VA.
"Ray Charles was a true original, a musical genius and a friend and brother to me," said Adams, the entertainer's longtime manager and business partner.
"He pioneered a new style and opened the door for many young performers to follow. Some of his biggest fans were the young music stars of today, who loved and admired his talent and independent spirit."
In addition to multiple Grammy® Awards, including one for Lifetime Achievement, Charles is also one of the original inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and a recipient of the Presidential Medal for the Arts, France's Legion of Honor and the Kennedy Center Honors.
He has also been inducted into numerous other music Halls of Fame, including those for Jazz and Rhythm and Blues, a testament to his enormous influence.
"You can't run away from yourself," Charles once said. "I was raised in the church and was around blues and would hear all these musicians on the jukeboxes and then I would go to revival meetings on Sunday morning. So I would get both sides of music. A lot of people at the time thought it was sacrilegious but all I was doing was singing the way I felt."
Last May, he headlined the White House Correspondents Dinner in Wash., DC, at which President and Mrs. Bush, Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice, were in attendance, and he also starred with Vince Gill, George Jones and Glen Campbell in a Nashville television special saluting country music's top 100 hits.
Charles' performance of "Behind Closed Doors" on the TV special garnered the evening's biggest standing ovation.
In 2002, Charles celebrated the 40th anniversary of his first country hit, "I Can't Stop Loving You," which became a number one chart topper and expanded the scope of the entertainer's career to the industry's astonishment.
Last year, the press-shy Charles sat for interviews in Los Angeles with film star Clint Eastwood, who conversed with the music pioneer about the blues for a documentary, "Piano Blues," seen on PBS, and also reunited with his longtime friend and early record industry patron, Ahmet Ertegun, founder of Atlantic Records, for a television profile on the record label legend.
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