I met Ray Charles on three occasions. Twice I tuned pianos for his concerts, and once a family friend, who is a private pilot, flew him to an engagement and invited me along for the ride. I almost wished I had stayed home when Ray, despite the fact that he was blind, asked if he could fly the plane for a bit and my friend let him take the controls! My most vivid memory of Ray Charles, however, involves a showdown with a famous maestro, who, due largely to modesty, asked me not to mention him by name. The maestro was to conduct a large orchestra that was performing a tribute to Ray's music and Ray was appearing as the featured soloist. On some songs both Ray, and the maestro, would be playing two Steinway pianos in duets. I tuned both instruments. When I was finished the maestro and Ray sat down at their respective pianos to make certain they were satisfied with the harmony of the two Steinways together. Ray broke away form the regular score and played a sassy jazz riff. Acknowledging Ray's "challenge" the maestro played the same riff just as well and added a bit more to it. Ray responded by matching the maestro's performance and added yet more, upping the ante. What Ray didn't know, or, may have forgotten, is that prior to becoming an orchestra conductor, the maestro had a whole other career as a jazz pianist and had won many honors including DOWNBEAT MAGAZINE'S annual jazz poll and the famed Newport Jazz Festival. In fact he had won both several times! So it was that when Ray sent forth his next challenge from the keyboard the maestro, who had grown tired of the game, cut loose with an astonishing full keyboard multi arpeggio that contained elements of jazz, classical, blues, and whatever else flew out of his fingers at lightning speed. Ray just threw both his hands up in the air in surrender and shook his head. Ray's good natured comment was, "I guess that's why the call him maestro, and they just call me Ray."
