Born Ruth Alston Weston on 30th January 1928 in Portsmouth, Virginia, she attended I. C. Norcom High School, a historically black high school. Brown's father was a dockhand who directed the local church choir, but the young Ruth showed more of an interest in singing at USO shows and nightclubs. She was inspired by Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday and Dinah Washington. In 1945, Brown ran away from her home in Portsmouth along with a trumpeter, Jimmy Brown, whom she soon married, to sing in bars and clubs. She then spent a month with Lucky Millinder's orchestra, but was fired after she brought drinks to the band for free, and was left stranded in Washington, D.C.
Blanche Calloway, Cab Calloway's sister, also a bandleader, arranged a gig for Brown at a Washington nightclub called Crystal Caverns and soon became her manager. Willis Conover, a Voice of America disc jockey, caught her act and recommended her to Atlantic Records bosses, Ahmet Ertegün and Herb Abramson. Brown was unable to audition as planned though, because of a serious car accident that resulted in a nine-month hospital stay. In 1948, however, Ertegün and Abramson drove to Washington from New York City to hear her sing in the club. Although her repertoire was mostly popular ballads, Ertegün convinced her to switch to rhythm and blues. His productions for her, however, retained her pop style, with clean, fresh arrangements and the singing spot on the beat with little of the usual blues singer's embroidery.
In her first audition, in 1949, she sang "So Long", which became a hit. This was followed by "Teardrops from My Eyes" in 1950; written by Rudy Toombs, it was the first upbeat major hit for Ruth Brown, establishing her as an important figure in R&B. Recorded for Atlantic Records in New York City in September 1950, and released in October, it was on Billboard's List of number-one R&B hits (United States) for eleven weeks. The huge hit earned her the nickname "Miss Rhythm", and within a few months Ruth Brown became the acknowledged queen of R&B.
She followed up this hit with "I'll Wait for You" (1951), "I Know" (1951), "5-10-15 Hours" (1953), "(Mama) He Treats Your Daughter Mean" (1953), "Oh What a Dream" (1954), "Mambo Baby" (1954), and "Don't Deceive Me" (1960). She also became known as "Little Miss Rhythm" and "the girl with the teardrop in her voice". In all, she was on the R&B charts for 149 weeks from 1949 to 1955, with sixteen top-ten blues records including five number ones, and became Atlantic's most popular artist, earning Atlantic records the proper name of "The House that Ruth Built".
During the 1960s, Brown faded from public view to become a housewife and mother, and only returned to music in 1975 at the urging of Redd Foxx, followed by a series of comic acting gigs, including roles in the sitcom Hello, Larry and the John Waters film Hairspray as local DJ Motormouth Maybelle, as well as Broadway appearances in Amen Corner and Black and Blue, which earned her a Tony Award for her performance and a Grammy award for her album Blues on Broadway, featuring hits from the show.
Brown's fight for musicians' rights and royalties in 1987 led to the founding of the Rhythm and Blues Foundation. She was inducted as a Pioneer Award recipient in its first year, 1989. In 1993, she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, as "The Queen Mother of the Blues".
She has become an iconic symbol to many black women for later generations, where she is also a favourite artist and inspiration for later blues artists such as Bonnie Raitt. Brown recorded and sang along with fellow rhythm and blues performer Charles Brown, a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and toured with Raitt on Raitt's tour in the late 1990s, "Road Tested". Her 1995 autobiography, Miss Rhythm, won the Gleason Award for music journalism.
Brown died in a Las Vegas-area hospital on 17th November 2006, from complications following a heart attack and stroke she suffered after surgery in October 2006. A memorial concert for her was held on 22nd January 2007 at the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, New York.
Love Letters
Ruth Brown Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Keep us so near while apart
I'm not alone in the night
When I can have all the love you write
I memorize every line
And I kiss the name that you sign
And, darling, then I read again right from the start
I memorize every line
And I kiss the name that you sign
And, darlin', then I read again right from the start
Love letters straight from your heart
In the song "Love Letters," Ruth Brown sings about the power of love letters in keeping her connected to her faraway lover. The lyrics suggest that these love letters are not just words on a page, but rather an extension of her lover's heart and a physical manifestation of his love. When she reads them, she feels as though she is not alone and that he is with her in spirit. The act of memorizing and kissing the name that he signs at the end of each letter is a way for her to keep his memory close to her heart.
More broadly, the song speaks to the timeless theme of the power of written communication to keep people connected, particularly in a time before the internet and instant messaging. The lyrics capture the vulnerability and intimacy of sharing one's innermost feelings with another person through the written word.
Line by Line Meaning
Love letters straight from your heart
Written expressions of your love that come from the deepest part of your emotions.
Keep us so near while apart
Those love letters draw us closer to each other even when we're physically separated.
I'm not alone in the night
Even though I am alone in my sleep, the memory of your love through those letters keeps me company.
When I can have all the love you write
When I'm reading your heartfelt expressions on those letters, I can revel in every kiss, hug, and cuddle that you put down.
I memorize every line
Every word that comes from your heart is worth committing to memory.
And I kiss the name that you sign
The name with which you sign every letter holds the key to my heart, so I kiss it as a symbol of my unending love.
And, darling, then I read again right from the start
Every letter represents a new opportunity for me to relive the feelings it brings up all over again, from the beginning.
Love letters straight from your heart
Written expressions of your love that come from the deepest part of your emotions.
Lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: Victor Young, Edward Heyman
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind