Is James Ingram Your Brother?

James Ingram

One of the questions that I get quite often is, 'are you and James Ingram brothers?' The answer is YES. We come from a musical family. There's actually 6 of us. It goes in this order, Henry, Joyce, James, Janice, David and then me, Phillip, yes I'm the youngest. We grew up in Akron, Ohio. James and I are the only ones that decided to make a living out of the music industry.

When James was about 13 or 14 he got into his 1st band, 'Sharpee and the G-Clefs'. James and I are 6 years apart, so I was about 7 or 8 years old. But James actually inspired my love for music. As his little brother, James would take me to some of his rehearsals. I LOVED going to rehearsals with him. I would see the drums, and the keyboards, but you know how big brothers are, 'don't touch anything', back then I was like if I can't touch anything why did you bring me? But of course as I got older I totally understood.

So I would go with James and listen to them play and sing harmonies and that got me hooked. I would practice, using a pencil as a microphone, singing records that we had around the house. Well as we got a little older James joined a band called 'Revelation Funk', interesting names huh? James was the keyboard player and sang leads and background and a guy by the name of Bernard Lawson was the lead singer.

REVELATION FUNK

As you can see in this picture, Bernard is the one sitting in the seat and James is the one just to the right with with the hat. Well let me tell you what solidified me knowing without a shadow of a doubt, ain't got to think twice about it my decision to do music as a living. I was either 12 or 13, 'Revelation Funk', my brothers band, performed at the Akron Civic Center. They had done some touring up in Canada and was just back. I saw that particular show, was very proud of my brother and said, 'this is what I'm going to do'.


Well not too long after that I got into my first band 'Raw Soul.' Just about that time Revelation Funk moved to California to try and make it big. The band eventually broke up but James decided to stay and make a go of it. As you may know the story 4 years later when SWITCH was getting together that's when I called James and told him that I had a record deal and he couldn't believe it because he was out in California and I was still in Akron. So during that time when SWITCH was on the rise James wasn't known yet. But in every interview when I was asked who was your inspiration into the music industry, I would always respond my brother James. From the time that SWITCH did their first record, it had only been about 10-11 years since James had brought me to my first rehearsals, and only about 4 - 5 years from the time that I had made my decision to do music for a living, when I saw 'Revelation Funk' at the Akron Civic Center with one of my older brothers James. I'm still proud of what he's accomplished in the music industry. I also know that this is a long answer to the question, is James Ingram Your Brother?  I could've just said 'yes' but I figured I give a little more background :-)

Until Next Time - Phillip