By Jake Moore
Otis Ray Redding Jr. also known as The Big O or The King of Soul was born in Dawson, Georgia in 1941. Just three years after Redding was born his family moved to Macon, Georgia. His father’s primary occupation was sharecropper but Otis Redding Sr. was also a preacher. And it was in the church that Otis first got into music. He performed in the church choir and learned guitar and piano to play during the service.
Just a few years later when Otis turned 10 he would sing live on the air for a Macon Gospel station for six dollars a performance. From that point on, Redding said that he didn’t want to do anything else but sing.
However, life got in Otis’ way when his father contracted Tuberculosis. Redding withdrew himself from school to help his mother provide for the family. In this time, Redding worked several jobs including gold mining and briefly working as a gas station attendant. But Redding was still pursuing his true passion of music by performing in clubs around Macon and participating in local talent shows.
In 1958, Redding and a group he had been performing with participated in a Macon radio contest called The Teenage Party. In the crowd was guitarist Johnny Jenkins who saw Redding perform and thought he was a transcendent talent, but his band was lacking. So--he offered to perform with Redding. But some time after this event, the dominoes began to fall for Redding. With Jenkin’s help, Redding won The Teenage Party contest contest 15 weeks in a row.
Eventually Redding joined Jenkin’s band named The Pinetoppers and initially it was Jenkins who was receiving the most career attention which led them to Stax Records in Memphis.
Jenkins was initially concerned about the deal because Jenkins had no way of getting to memphis because he didn't have a driver's license. But luckily Otis Redding took it upon himself to drive his buddy to stax records.
When Redding and Jenkins arrived to Stax the staff immediately asked Jenkins to perform with Booker T. and the MG’s--famous from Green Onions and Melting Pot. But the Jenkins session went absolutely nowhere and people started to pack up and headout.
But Otis spoke up and asked for a shot.
Initially, the Stax staff granted Redding’s request just to humor him but they quickly swallowed any would be laughter as Redding broke out the pipes and was signed to a record deal. According to some people at Stax the song that sealed the deal for his contract was the now iconic, These Arms of Mine.
These Arms of Mine was the song that jump started the rise of Otis Redding at it was included in his incredible first studio album released in 1964 called Pain in My Heart, which featured the great tracks You Send Me and a great cover of Ben E King’s Stand by Me.
The album released to relative success peaking at number 20 on the R&B charts. And the success was enough for Redding to record some live tracks at the Apollo theatre.
At this event Redding met tons of big names including but not limited to Muhammed Ali and Ben E. King who’s song Redding covered just months ago. And King gave Redding some money because he had heard that Redding was in financial trouble.
After some changes in Reddings band he moved on to focus on his next studio album and he made the decision to focus on slower music for the most part which led to the nickname Mr. Pitiful which Otis loved so much that he decided to write and record an upbeat tempo song of the same name.
Redding and his crew combined that track with several other hit singles to form the album The Great Otis Redding Sings Soul Ballads.
Following the release of that album, Redding’s friend and partner Johnny Jenkins would go off on his one to create a style separate from redding, in other words--he was jealous.
Redding replaced him and immediately began work on a new album, writing 10 songs within a 24 hour period. One of these songs ended up being the now iconic Aretha Franklin track, Respect.
In 1965 Otis released a New Studio album called Otis Blue which is a really great mix of original work and excellent covers.
Otis Blue was a big hit and Otis started to become a certified star. He bought a large ranch in Georgia and started his own music production company called Jotis. He also went back to Los Angeles to perform at the Whisky a Go Go and here he had a legendary performance which garnered the attention of many rock fans and rock artists including Bob Dylan.
While playing at the Whisky, Redding returned to Stax records to begin recording more music. One of these songs was the 1932 classic, Try A Little Tenderness. The song was made famous by Frank Sinatra and when music producers heard that Redding wanted to do a version, they tried to stop it due to racial reasons. But Redding and Stax pressed and now that track is considered to be one of Reddings’ best.
That track went onto appear on Otis’ next album, Dictionary of Soul. And dictionary of soul was a big hit, Redding's biggest to that date. So big that Redding started a European tour.
In 1967, Redding recorded a great duet album with Carla Thomas, (aka the queen of Memphis soul) and they had some great collaborations on that album but that's not all Otis was doing at this time. Redding released a live version of his European tour for everyone to listen to enjoy and Redding also went to San Francisco for the Monterey Pop festival. There must have been something about the Bay Area air that made the performers up the ante. Hendrix lit his guitar on fire and Redding was flying around on stage.
In December of 1967, Otis Redding returned to Stax records to record another song but this one was a little different. Redding was inspired by the Beatles Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club. Initially, Stax didn’t like the nuanced and slower style that Redding was going for but Redding was into it so they went and produced what is now considered one of the most legendary songs of all time--Sitting on the Dock of the Bay.
Just a couple of weeks after Redding recorded Sittin on the Dock of the Bay redding boarded a flight from Cleveland to Madison, Wisconsin on a frigid night with dense fog. After entering wisconsin the plane crashed and four people were killed including Otis Redding. He was only 26 years old.
Despite his young age, Otis Redding is recognized as one of the most important musicians of all time. Major artists like The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and The Doors listed Redding as one of their biggest influences.
Inducted Redding in 1989, declaring his name to be "synonymous with the term soul music that arose out of the black experience in America through the transmutation of gospel and rhythm and blues into a form of funky, secular testifying."
A statement that could not be more true.