MONDAY
E-mail a friendJames Ingram
airdate April 9, 2009
Since the ‘80s, James Ingram has created all types of music and worked with some of the greats, including Ray Charles and Quincy Jones. He co-wrote "P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)"—a signature tune on Michael Jackson's historic '82 "Thriller" album, and has had hit collaborations with such artists as Patti Austin and Michael McDonald. Ingram has won multiple Grammys and back-to-back Oscar nods. The Ohio native, and self-taught musician, began performing with the band Revelation Funk. His latest release CD is "Stand (In The Light)."
Singer-songwriter reflects on working with Michael Jackson. (1:47)
Full interview. (13:27)
James Ingram
Tavis: I am pleased, delighted, honored, just tickled to welcome James Ingram to this program - one of my favorites. The Grammy-winning R&B singer and musician is responsible for so many great songs during a wonderful career, including classics like, of course, "Just Once," "100 Ways," "Yah-Mo B There." I'm out of time.
His latest project has a distinct gospel feel. It's called "Stand in the Light." From Jame's new CD, here's some of the video for the single "Don't Let Go."
[Clip]
Tavis: I could swear, James Ingram, I heard in that song a lyric that said keep the faith?
James Ingram: Mm-hmm.
Tavis: I ain't got no royalty check. (Laughter)
Ingram: Oh, that's -
Tavis: That's my line every night, man. Thanks for watching, keep the faith. Then now you're saying keep the faith?
Ingram: Well, yeah, but see, I continued. (Laughter) Because my father taught me faith in God and confidence in myself and there was nothing that I couldn't do. I got out of that one - whew.
Tavis: Yeah. (Laughter) I thought I had a check coming out of that. (Laughter) How you been, man?
Ingram: All right, great. How you doing, brother?
Tavis: Good to see you. I'm well, man. If you have heard "Yah-Mo B There" and you don't like it, there's something wrong with you because that song just moves me every time I hear it. And so you've done the gospel thing before - you come out of the church - but this is the first gospel CD. Why? Why now?
Ingram: Well, Jeff Majors has a gospel show on TV One and he called me to sing on the show, and we was trying to figure out what I could sing. And my wife overheard the conversation and she said, "Well, why don't you sing 'Mercy'?" It's a song that I wrote with Debbie Allen in a play.
But it's seven minutes long. But he said, "Can you cut it down to four minutes?" So I cut it down to four minutes, came in and sang the song and had such a great response from it, Cathy Hughes (sp) and my wife double-teamed me and said, "Look, what you going to do?" I said, "About what?" (Laughter) They said, "You need to finish this album." "Okay, I'll submit."
Tavis: And the rest is history.
Ingram: Yeah; oh, no, her story - not his story.
Tavis: Her story, yeah. (Laughter) In this case, Debbie's story. Tell me why, all the years you have been singing - and again, given your background - you hadn't done a gospel album before now?
Ingram: Well, see, the thing was my first coming out was in 1981 with Quincy's album, with "Just Once" and "One Hundred Ways," right? But for me to honor my parents, my father being a deacon at a church and a Sunday school teacher and everything, my first album that came out of 1983, that's when I brought y'all "Yah-Mo B There," which is hallelujah, praise be to God, by its Hebrew name.
The Old Testament's translated in Hebrew and the New Testament's translated in Greek, so the father's name was Yahweh and the son's name was Yeshua; Yeshua means "salvation," Yahweh means "source." So to make a long story short, it was just - it just happened.
Tavis: What did you make of the success of "Yah-Mo B There," because a lot of people are just now hearing - they sing along with the song all the time and they're just now hearing, after all these years of hearing it since the '80s, what the song really means, what the song is really all about.
So what do you make of a song that connects with people and they don't even altogether know what they're saying, what the song is about?
Ingram: Well, because I don't know if it's on my behalf in terms of Michael McDonald (mimics Michael McDonald) (Laughter) I don't know if it had anything to do with that, but the thing was, "Yah, mo be there." "Mo" is Black slang for "will." "You coming to the party?" "Yeah, I mo be there." (Laughter)
But at the same time - so you have some of our "isms" in there, because "Yah-weh" wouldn't sing well.
Tavis: Right, but ya-mo works.
Ingram: Oh, man, it rolls. But - don't do that, now. But the first lyric is "Heavenly father watching us fall. We take from each other and give nothing at all. It's a doggone shame, but never to' late for change. So if your love runs low, reach out and call his name - ya-mo be there." Yeah, so it's like -
Tavis: It worked, man.
Ingram: It was the most played record that year, and thank God for it. And thank Michael McDonald, too. We wrote that together.
Tavis: Speaking of Michael, let me go from Michael McDonald to another Michael, and I'll come back to the project in just a second. Before you walked on the set I played a trivia game with my staff and I asked them, as I will now ask the audience, what song on the biggest-selling record of all time - you got that part right; "Thriller," Michael Jackson - what song on "Thriller" did James Ingram write for Michael? In five, four, three - just giving you some time to figure it out - three, two - hit it, James.
Ingram: That's how I can afford these new gators.
Tavis: Them gators - Michael paid for them gators, didn't he?
Ingram: Yup.
Tavis: All right, so one person in the studio, Chris McDonald, got it right. But what song did James Ingram write for Michael Jackson?
Ingram: PYT.
Tavis: PYT - "Pretty Young Thing."
Ingram: Yeah.
Tavis: Tell me about that song. I love it.
Ingram: Well, the thing was, when we went - we're in the studio, right?
Tavis: Right, right.
Ingram: This is my first time seeing Michael sing, right? And so I've never seen anybody do this - Michael did this. He was, like - (singing) Where did you come from, baby, and ooh, won't you take me there? Right away, won't you, baby? Tenderoni, you got to be; spark my nature, sugar, fly with me. Don't you know now, it's - I said, "Oh, my God."
Everybody I know, we'd be holding our breath trying to get everything on that microphone. I'm like this - (singing) Ya-mo be there. (Laughter) And so Michael came out sweating and everything, he said, "Am I singing all right?" I said, "Michael, you killin' it, however you want to sing it." (Laughter)
Tavis: So he's dancing and singing in the studio.
Ingram: I've never seen nobody in my life, and I've been into a lot of sessions, right? I've never seen nobody. Everybody's trying to hold their breath for the mic. Michael don't care. No, Michael is the genius that he is, brother.
Tavis: So how did he, since you are a songwriter and a performer, how did Michael do with your PYT? Were you happy with it?
Ingram: He killed it. He killed it. He put some of his own flavor in there and made it happen, yeah.
Tavis: As a kid growing up in a church like you, we used to sing track number three all the time and the treatment you put on it is a beautiful thing. But tell me why you love - apparently, because you put it on your record - "Blessed Assurance."
Ingram: It's a hymn and I just loved it. I just love the song.
Tavis: And the lyrics are cold, aren't they?
Ingram: Yeah, man.
Tavis: "Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine, oh, what a foretaste?"
Ingram: Right. I don't know if it's in the 1800s or the - but it goes back, it just cuts. It cuts.
Tavis: Track number 10, "For All We Know."
Ingram: That was - "Don't Let Go," that was me talking to my father, thanking him, because see, my parents are gone. That was giving my father praise in terms of what he gave me. "For All We Know" ends the album. I sang that as my mother's funeral. Yeah.
Tavis: How does one stand up, compose himself to sing at your mama's funeral? And we can just tell in this short conversation the reverence you have for your parents. How'd you do that?
Ingram: Well, because one of the reasons is I live in Los Angeles, California. My parents lived in Akron, Ohio. I'm the only one of the siblings that came back and got my mother's last breath. It just happened like that. I came back and I got my father's last breath with at least three of my other siblings in Akron, Ohio.
So I felt that I was spiritually mature enough that I helped them. I helped them when they were leaving. I assisted them in their flight to the next level - whatever that means.
Tavis: Which ties into the next track I want to ask you about, track number six. You went back and got that old Bernard Eigner hit, "Everything Must Change."
Ingram: Right, you - huh? (Laughter) Oh, now you're laughing at me, see? Huh? Huh? Sue? Lawsuit, Debbie? What, what, huh?
Tavis: "Everything Must Change." Your hair goes, your parents go - everything changes over time.
Ingram: Right, everything's leaving. You better not try to go nowhere, baby.
Tavis: He's pointing to Debbie, toward Debbie - she better not go nowhere.
Ingram: No.
Tavis: How do you know, speaking of "Everything Must Change," how do you know when a song makes sense for you to cover it?
Ingram: You get the chills. You get that thing - it's a thing, you know what I mean? I write a lot of songs, but I already know, even after I write them and go sing them, that's not for me. It's just that something had to come through me just as a process of writing. But the ones that grab me and won't let me go?
Tavis: Then you know.
Ingram: Yeah.
Tavis: When you - here on the stage or a minute ago or in studio - when you hit it, it all comes out and you ain't - you say everything must change, you ain't getting no younger, but the pipes ain't going nowhere.
Ingram: No, but I've been doing a track program for years. I had a track scholarship to go to a school, but I didn't want to leave my band in Akron, Ohio. But I understood the older we get, the respiratory starts to dissipate so I'm out at the track five days a week, when it's not raining and stuff.
Tavis: Doing what, running?
Ingram: Yeah, sprinting. We jog a mile or two, sweatsuits, it's a thing. It's a regimen. Then after that you come and you jump (unintelligible) jump that, and then you - you know what I'm saying? And then you do twenty-five - four sets of push-ups and sit-ups and then pull-ups, and boom. Yeah.
Tavis: My doctor's watching - he watches every night - so Dr. Richardson, if that's what it takes, my voice is just going to go, I'm sorry. It's just going to go.
Ingram: Now, see, with my regimen I would be much slimmer if my wife wasn't the best Chef Boyardee in the world. (Laughter) If it weren't for that, I'd be slim for real.
Tavis: You've been together how many years?
Ingram: We've been married for 35 years, but I knew her when she was five and I was seven. Ooh, what - uh-oh.
Tavis: Wow - what? That sounded like a song.
Ingram: Yeah, "Ooh, What, Ooh, What?" You want to publish it? (Laughter) Let's finish it.
Tavis: If you write it, I will publish it. We're going to end what we began. That'll be your way of respecting me for taking my keep the faith thing.
Ingram: All right, man.
Tavis: No, I'm just teasing. (Laughter) The new record from James Ingram is called "Stand in the Light." If you love his stuff, and we all do, whether you love the Quincy stuff, the Disney stuff, the "Yah-Mo B There" stuff.
Ingram: Or Michael's. (Laughs)
Tavis: The Michael stuff. His first full-on gospel record, you got to have it for your collection. James, I love you, and there ain't nothing you can do about it.
Ingram: Love you too, brother.
Tavis: Good to see you.
Ingram: You, too.
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