About
ARETHA ROBINSON
legendary musician Ray Charles credits
the love, guidance and strength of his
mother, Aretha Robinson, for his ability to
navigate through the darkness and achieve
a brilliant career in music.
“She let me roam, let me make my
own mistakes, let me discover the world for
myself,” Ray said. But because of his mother’s
devotion and tough love, Ray developed
a fierce independence and the ability to
maneuver so adroitly that some people, later
in his life, doubted that he was really blind.
Aretha and Bailey Robinson lived in
abject poverty, first in Albany, Ga., where
Ray was born on Sept. 23, 1930, and later in
Greenville, Fla., where they moved when Ray
was a few months old. She took in laundry,
and Bailey worked off and on for the railroads.
Ray Charles with his mother,
However, she became a single mother when
Aretha Robinson, circa 1944
Bailey left their home, leaving her to raise Ray
and his younger brother, George, alone.
Aretha’s youngest son, George, drowned in one of her washtubs when he was five
years old. Soon after, Ray began to lose his sight, apparently as the result of untreated
glaucoma, and was completely blind by age seven.
Aretha prepared her son to live without sight, making him continue to do his
daily chores. “You may be blind,” Ray remembered that she told him, “but ... you have
to do things for yourself, no one else will do them for you.”
Aretha managed to get him accepted as a charity student at the Florida State
School for the Deaf and the Blind (known at the time as the Institute for the Blind,
Deaf and Dumb), in St. Augustine, about 130 miles southeast of Greenville.
She died shortly before Ray’s 15th birthday. It was, Ray wrote later, the most
devastating experience of his life. He felt like “truly a lost child.”
But because of Aretha Robinson’s unflinching devotion to her son, Ray Charles
was able to scale unimaginable musical heights. Morehouse granted Ray an honorary
degree in 2001. Later that year, the musician—who was often referred to as “The
Genius”—made two $1-million gifts to the College to seal a mutual commitment to
find, educate and inspire the next generation of music pioneers. The gifts became seed
money for the Ray Charles Performing Arts Center and Music Academic Building.
The naming of the Music Academic Building for his mother would have been a dream
come true for Ray. Valerie Ervin, president of The Ray Charles Foundation, said that before
his death in 2004, Ray made very clear his desire to leave a lasting legacy for his mother.
Ervin announced the foundation’s $3-million gift during the “A Candle in the Dark”
Gala in February 2013 to secure the naming of the Aretha Robinson Music Academic
Building, making Ray’s wish a reality.
NAMING CEREMONY PLANNING COMMITTEE
Phillip D. Howard ‘87
Vice President
Office of Institutional Advancement
Satyn Geary
Researcher
Office of Institutional Advancement
Kathleen Johnson
Committee Chair
Special Assistant to the President and
Associate Vice President
Office of Institutional Advancement
Vickie G. Hampton
Publications Manager
Office of Communications
Ardis Blanchard
Manager of Major Giving Programs
Office of Institutional Advancement
David Collins
Technical Support Analyst
Office of Institutional Advancement
Toni O’Neal Mosley
Director of Public Relations
Office of Communications
Leroy Richardson
Special Assistant to the President
Office of Institutional Advancement
Shiekgo Carter
Event Support Services Coordinator
Office of Campus Operations
SPECIAL ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Uzee Brown ‘72
Chairman
Department of Music
James Smartt
Director
Office of Event Support Services
Blake Gaines
Director, Bands
Department of Music
David Morrow ‘80
Director, Morehouse College Glee Club
Department of Music
MOREHOUSE COLLEGE AT A GLANCE
MISSION
The mission of Morehouse
College is to provide a
comprehensive academic,
social and spiritual experience
that prepares its students for
leadership and success in the
larger society.
PRESIDENT
John Silvanus Wilson Jr. ’79 is
the 11th president of Morehouse
College. He is the former
executive director of the White
House Initiative on Historically
Black Colleges and Universities.
Before working with the White
House Initiative, Wilson was an
associate professor of higher
education in the Graduate School
of Education and an executive
dean at The George Washington
University. He also spent 16
years at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, where he
served as director of foundation
relations and assistant provost.
ENROLLMENT
With an enrollment of
approximately 2,100, the student
body represents more than 40
states and 14 countries.
830 WESTVIEW DRIVE, S.W.
I
FACULTY
164 full-time; 69 part-time; 100%
of tenured and tenure-track faculty
holds terminal degrees
ACADEMIC PROGRAMS
Morehouse operates under the
semester system offering the
Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor
of Science degrees. The College
offers 26 majors in three academic
divisions: Humanities and Social
Sciences, Science and Mathematics,
and Business Administration and
Economics, and a dual-degree
program in engineering with the
Georgia Institute of Technology.
ACCREDITATION
Morehouse is accredited by
the Commission on Colleges
of the Southern Association of
Colleges and Schools (SACS) to
award baccalaureate degrees.
Morehouse is one of five
Historically Black Colleges and
Universities, and one of four
undergraduate institutions in
Georgia, with a Phi Beta Kappa
National Honor Society chapter.
The College also is one of only four
liberal arts colleges in the nation
with accreditation from both the
AACSD International Association
for Management Education and a
Phi Beta Kappa chapter.
ATLANTA, GA 30314
I
SPECIAL PROGRAMS
Special programs include Phi Beta
Kappa, Honors, Study Abroad, The
Andrew Young Center for Global
Leadership, and Research Careers.
The College also houses the
Morehouse Research Institute, the
Leadership Center at Morehouse
College and the Morehouse Male
Initiative.
AFFILIATIONS
Morehouse is a member of the
Georgia Research Alliance, Atlanta
Regional Council for Higher
Education, Associated Colleges of
the South, and Atlanta University
Center, a consortium of four
historically black institutions,
including Clark Atlanta University,
Morehouse School of Medicine and
Spelman College.
ATHLETICS
Morehouse is a member of
the Southern Intercollegiate
Athletic Conference (SIAC) and
the National Collegiate Athletic
Association (NCAA) Division
II. Varsity letter sports include
football, basketball, tennis, golf,
baseball, cross country and
track and field.
404-215-2660
I
morehouse.edu
Naming Ceremony
of the
ARETHA ROBINSON
MUSIC ACADEMIC BUILDING
December 3, 2013
10 a.m.
Naming of the
ARETHA ROBINSON MUSIC ACADEMIC BUILDING
NAMING CEREMONY IN THE ATRIUM OF THE RAY CHARLES PERFORMING ARTS CENTER
10:00 A.M.
Dear Friends of Morehouse,
We are pleased and honored to gather here today to formally
dedicate the Aretha Robinson Music Academic Building, an
extraordinary facility named after a most extraordinary woman.
This building, which was made possible in part by the Ray Charles
Foundation, reflects Charles’ strong support for Morehouse College.
Through the years, Charles gave generously of this time, talent and
treasure to strengthen the financial underpinnings of the College and
took a particular interest in our diverse music education programs.
Thus it is fitting that this building will bear in perpetuity the name
of someone who steadfastly supported Charles’ music education and
aspirations so that he would one day become an international treasure
who would earn the title “Genius.”
Within the Music Academic Building, the legend of Ray Charles
lives on. Morehouse students enjoy the benefits of new and expanded
practice and performance space, including, among other facilities:
rehearsal rooms, fully-equipped studios, listening stations, reading
rooms and a performance library. These state-of-the-art facilities allow
our students to hone their music talents in ways that simply were not
possible before. In this way, the Aretha Robinson Music Academic
Building represents the fulfillment of Charles’ distinctive intent to find,
educate and inspire the next generation of music pioneers, and is a
direct extension of his legacy of giving.
I thank all of you for joining us today on this special occasion. The
Morehouse family is profoundly grateful to the Ray Charles Foundation
for helping us bring this building to fruition and for consistently
supporting us in a variety of ways.
And we are indebted to a host of College friends, alumni, faculty,
staff and students who leant their support to this endeavor. This is truly
a great day for all who treasure the memory of Ray Charles and his
beloved mother, Aretha Robinson.
Long live the Genius.
John Silvanus Wilson Jr. ’79
President
OCCASION
Dr. Garikai Campbell
Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs
DEDICATORY PRAYER
Dr. Lawrence E. Carter Sr.
Dean of the Martin Luther King Jr. International
Chapel and Professor of Religion
REMARKS
Mr. Robert C. Davidson Jr. ’67
Chairman of the Morehouse College Board of Trustees
President
Dr. John Silvanus Wilson Jr. ’79
NAME UNVEILING
Mr. Davidson
ACCEPTANCE
Ms. Valerie Ervin
President, The Ray Charles Foundation
CLOSING REMARKS
Dr. Campbell
SPECIAL PERFORMANCES IN THE EMMA AND JOE ADAMS CONCERT HALL
10:45 A.M.
GUIDED TOUR
11:45 A.M.
About the
MUSIC ACADEMIC BUILDING
IN THE RAY CHARLES PERFORMING ARTS CENTER
THE MUSIC ACADEMIC BUILDING of the Ray Charles Performing Arts Center
is designed to address the instructional, rehearsal and performance space needs for
several generations of Morehouse students.
The building features 12 faculty studios, two electronic classrooms, nine practice
rooms, dedicated storage areas for students’ instruments, a library for sheet music
and three academic labs—one of which is the David Geffen Keyboard Digital Music
Laboratory.
There are two rehearsal rooms—one each specifically designed for the
Morehouse College Marching Band and the Morehouse College Glee Club. The
rooms also accommodate small performances.
The Ray Charles Performing Arts Center is a $20-million, 76,000-square-foot
facility located at the edge of the historic West End district at the corner of Joseph P.
Lowery and West End avenues. The Center also houses the Emma and Joe Adams
Concert Hall, with a 550-fixed-seat capacity (a motorized orchestra pit that can be
raised to provide additional seating) and a state-of-the-art digital/analog recording
studio; a two-story atrium and reception area; and the Eugene Mitchell Performance
Lawn, which seats approximately 200 patrons.