Ray Brown, Jr.

Raymond Matthews Brown Jr. (born August 13, 1949) is an American jazz and blues singer. Life and career The adopted son of Ray Brown and Ella Fitzgerald, he was born in New York City, to Fitzgerald's half-sister Frances. Nat King Cole, Louis Armstrong, Frank Sinatra and many others were regular visitors during his childhood. After moving to California when he was 10, Ray discovered a passion for the drums and for singing. He attended Beverly Hills High School where he sang with school groups which toured at local festivals and hospitals. His father arranged for him to study with jazz percussionists Bill Douglass and Chuck Flores. Despite his jazz roots he admits that his interest in performing rock music was an act of rebellion. "I used to drive my parents crazy with this. I told my father a few years before he died, you know a lot of times I played that music 'cause I just wanted to see the look on your face.".