1951 - No. 1 Billboard Pop Hit: "Cry," Johnnie Ray. By Billboard Staff 1999 – Curtis Mayfield, a pioneer of American soul music who penned some of the most lasting songs of the 1960s and ’70s, dies at ...

The late Sam Phillips famously said that if he could find a white singer with a negro feel, he'd make a million?and then stumbled across Elvis Presley. Maybe the early recordings of Johnnie Ray didn't ...