Leroy Burgess (born August 20, 1953) – I Keep Asking You Questions (1971)

This soul/funk masterpiece was the B-side to Black Ivory's debut single, co-written by Burgess with the rest of the group and producer Patrick Adams.

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The multi-talented singer/songwriter, musician, arranger and producer Leroy Burgess first rose to fame as the lead singer of Black Ivory, the 1970s R&B vocal group from Harlem who many feel should have been as big as the Jackson 5. After leaving the group in 1977, Burgess collaborated on several disco studio projects, and his soaring vocals helped define the emerging genre of boogie disco.

Born and raised in Harlem, Leroy O'Neil Jackson Jr.’s mother Myrtle Bell Burgess was a classically trained opera singer. Relatives on her side of the family include producer Thom Bell, singer Archie Bell, members of Kool & the Gang, and the Miami singer/songwriter Betty Wright.

When he was 16, Burgess was in a Harlem-based vocal group called the Mellow Souls. In the summer of 1969, 15-year-old Stuart Bascombe was invited to join and the two became fast friends. One of Bascombe’s classmates, Russell Patterson, joined that fall.

The trio met musical prodigy Patrick Adams, who was all of 18 years old at the time. Adams would soon become their mentor, manager, and producer, and changed their name to Black Ivory.

For their debut single, Adams wrote and arranged the flawless ballad “Don’t Turn Around.” Along with Burgess and the rest of the group, he co-wrote the B-side, the upbeat soul/funk bomb “I Keep Asking You Questions.” It was released in April, 1971 and cracked the top 40 on the R&B charts, reaching #38.

See our earlier posts on Russell Patterson and Patrick Adams for more on the group's history and the full story behind their first single.

For their third album Feel It (1975), Burgess and Bascombe co-wrote and co-produced the stellar disco-funk jam “Daily News,” with strings and horns co-arranged by Adams and Charlie Calello.

Burgess stepped away from Black Ivory in 1977, although he remained close with the other members. Before leaving, he wrote the disco-funk classic “Mainline.” Released by Black Ivory two years later in 1979, with Patterson on lead vocals, it became a club hit, reaching #57 on the dance charts. He then wrote, produced, and laid down vocals for several disco studio projects, including Logg, Inner Life, the Universal Robot Band, and Phreek, often collaborating with Adams.

In 1979, Burgess co-wrote, co-produced, arranged and conducted the dancefloor anthem “Slipped Disco” for the studio group Dazzle’s only album, released on Kool & the Gang’s longtime label De-Lite Records. It was co-produced by Stan Lucas, with strings and horns arranged by Adams.

Burgess also established his own new group, Convertion, which was largely a Burgess family affair. Besides himself on lead vocals, it featured his adopted brother James Calloway on bass, sister Renee J.J. Burgess and Dorothy Terrell on backing vocals, plus cousins Sonny T. Davenport on drums and Willis Long on percussion. Other members were Sonny DeGraffenreid on guitar, Fred McFarlane on keyboards, and Trevor Gale on live drums.

Their biggest hit was the WBLS and Paradise Garage standard “Let’s Do It” (1980). Co-written by Burgess, Calloway, and Davenport, and produced by frequent Adams collaborator Greg Carmichael, it helped jumpstart the early eighties genre of disco-funk that came to be known as boogie disco.

Around this time he also began working with TaharQa and Tunde Ra Aleem (aka Albert and Arthur Allen) as the lead vocalist for their group Aleem. Burgess was featured on their first single “Hooked On Your Love” (1979) along with Jocelyn Brown, Crystal Davis, and Luther Vandross on background vocals. It was a #15 disco hit and spent four months on the charts. Later tracks he appeared on included their electro classic “Release Yourself” (1984) and “Confusion” (1985).

Another track Burgess co-wrote with Convertion members Calloway and Davenport was the long lost “One Plus One.” Originally recorded in 1984 for an album that never came out, the completed tape went missing for 35 years until British DJ Dave Lee found it by chance in 2019 while combing through the Salsoul label’s archives.

In 1995, Black Ivory reunited and have continued to perform and record together ever since. They are one of the few remaining seventies R&B groups who are still performing today with all their original members.

Happy 70th Birthday to the legendary Leroy Burgess.

Further info:

“Leroy Burgess on the Reinvention of Black Ivory,” by Leroy Burgess, Red Bull Music Academy, November 18, 2016.

#soul #funk #BlackIvory #LeroyBurgess