Geoff Duncan

James Brown was hospitalized with pneumonia yesterday; at about 1:45 A.M. Christmas day, he died from conjunctive heart failure.

It's impossible to overstate Brown's contributions to popular music in the 20th century: he's in the same category as Elvis, The Beatles, and Bob Dylan not only because of his enduring popularity as an artist and performer, but because of the extent of his influence. Brown is widely known as the "Godfather of Soul" but it's equally true that he redefined R&B and played major roles in laying the foundations for funk, disco, rap, and hip-hop. He's also a prototype for the larger-than-live on-stage and off-stage personalities worn by many of the mediums top performers: without James Brown, the personas adopted by performers like Sly Stone, Michael Jackson, David Ruffin, Prince, would be very different—and far less flamboyant.

Most music fans associate Brown with his 1965 hits "Papa Gets a Brand New Bag" and "I Got You (I Feel Good)," but his first appearance on the R&B charts goes all the way back to 1956 with "Please, Please, Please." Brown's early R&B work followed the same lines of gospel-inspired music from Ray Charles and (to an extent) Little Richard—and, indeed, Brown never gave up doing ballads and even show tunes. But even early singles were showcasing what would become Brown's characteristic staccato vocal style and rhythm-heavy backing tracks. As Brown asserted himself more as a bandleader and songwriter, the driving on-the-one grooves and up-front horns took center stage. By 1961 Brown released what was essentially an instrumental single with "Night Train," defining what would be regarded as the fundamental James Brown style. By 1967, Brown released what many cite as the first pure funk recording (I'd also argue it was the spark which ignited disco), the all-groove "Cold Sweat"—which also gave birth to the single release "Funky Drummer," which ensured drummer Clyde Stubblefield would appear on more hip-hop, rap, and drum-n-bass recordings than perhaps any other performer. As the 1970s got underway, Brown recorded tracks which would define funk and soul, what would eventually become a core library for hip-hop and rap artists and producers: tight horn bursts, groove-driven songs, break beats, super-tight highly-refined rhythm sections. The albums Get on the Good Foot, Hell, and The Payback are among the most-sampled records of all time. And Brown did not shy away from social issues: 1968's "Say It Loud - I'm Black and I'm Proud" literally changed the language of racial issues in the U.S. at the height of the civil rights movement.

Throughout his career, Brown was perhaps better known for his live recordings than pure studio work: in fact, some of his studio albums were spiced up with recorded crowd noise to tap into the success of 1962's Live at The Apollo. As a live performer, Brown was billed as the "Hardest Working Man in Show Business," toured heavily, and reportedly shed two or three pounds during each performance; his show-ending faux-fainting episodes during which the band pretended to try to get him to leave the stage were legendary. Add to that his fast-moving feet, Elvis-like tight pants and sequined capes, outrageous pompadour hair, and blatant eye makeup, and you have a live performance icon who made other artists shake in their boots. In a 1964 concert James Brown famously upstaged the Rolling Stones: legend has Mick Jagger chain smoking in the wings, trying to calm his nerves, knowing he had to go on next. Brown was a notoriously tight disciplinarian with his band: players were expected to show up on time, adhere to a dress code, stay clean, and could be fined for wrong notes or even fired for bad haircuts. Some musicians responded to this better than others: bassist William "Bootzilla" Collins got fired after several confrontations and an onstage LSD hallucination: he'd later become a foundation of the P-Funk umbrella of bands. In 1969 Brown fired his entire band; a short while later nearly every member of Brown's band quit to go play with Maceo Parker.

Brown was not without his personal troubles. His behavior became increasingly erratic with arrests for alcohol abuse and drug possession; he was also charged with beating his third wife, Adrienne. In September 1988, police chased Brown, who was high on PCP and toting a gun, for half an hour on an interstate freeway between Georgia and South Carolina, finally stopping him by shooting out the tires on his truck. Brown served 15 months (and 10 months in work release) on a six year prison sentence before being paroled in 1991.

But Brown's musical legacy is strong, shows no signs of waning, and will endure for decades to come. James Brown made it funky and kept it that way: there's no turning back.