Ronnie Wilson obituary

Ronnie Wilson, who has died aged 73 following a stroke, was the oldest of the three brothers who formed the Gap Band in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1967. A singer and multi-instrumentalist who played keyboards, trumpet and flugelhorn, Wilson was integral to the ensemble, which enjoyed a string of indelible funk-soul hits in the late 1970s and early 80s.

Among the best loved of these were Oops Up Side Your Head, Burn Rubber On Me (Why You Wanna Hurt Me), Early in the Morning, You Dropped a Bomb on Me, Outstanding and Party Train. Their songs were distinguished by their frequent use of powerful synthesiser basslines.

Wilson was also co-writer on songs including Party Lights, Yearning for Your Love and Oops Up Side Your Head. The last of these reached No 6 in the UK and 4 on the US R&B charts in 1979, and later earned Wilson and his brothers co-writing credits on Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars’s massive international hit Uptown Funk (2014), owing to the resemblance between the two tracks.

By 1982 the Gap Band was one of the biggest-selling R&B acts in the US, with the albums Gap Band III (1980) and Gap Band IV (1982) both achieving platinum status. Their commercial profile dwindled as the 80s wore on, though, and All of my Love (1989), partly written by Ronnie, was the band’s last No 1 on the US R&B chart.

Ronnie was born in Tulsa, the eldest son of the Rev Oscar Wilson, a Pentecostal minister, and his wife, Irma. Oscar preached at the Church of God and Christ in Tulsa, and the three boys – Ronnie, Charlie and Robert – sang there regularly as their father’s warm-up act. Ronnie recalled: “Dad would give us one of those famous looks, warning us that if we didn’t tear up the church house and have everybody shouting by the time he got up to speak, we were in for a whoppin’.”

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While their parents would only permit religious music to be played in the family home, the brothers would smuggle in records by James Brown or Stevie Wonder and listen to them secretly. While in high school, Ronnie and Charlie each started their own band, but then merged the two together and brought in Robert on bass. They originally called themselves the Greenwood, Archer and Pine Street Band, deriving the name from streets in the Greenwood district.

This had been the site of the Tulsa race massacre in 1921, which left at least 100 residents dead, both black and white. They shortened the name to the Gap Band when it proved too long to fit on a concert poster, and played local venues such as the Gallery and the International Club.

They took their first step towards wider recognition when an associate of the local musician Leon Russell saw them at the International Club and invited them to Russell’s recording studio. Russell, a successful solo artist who had collaborated with Eric Clapton and George Harrison, recruited the Gap Band to play on his album Stop All That Jazz (1974), and in the same year they recorded their own album, Magicians Holiday, on Russell’s label, Shelter.

This failed to set the charts alight, as did the follow-up The Gap Band (1977), but the tide turned when they signed with the Los Angeles-based producer Lonnie Simmons’s Total Experience Productions. A deal with Mercury Records ensued, and their 1979 album, also called The Gap Band, reached No 10 on the Billboard R&B chart, with Shake reaching 4 on the R&B singles chart.

Before 1979 was out they had released The Gap Band II, which gave them another hit with Oops Up Side Your Head (on the album, the track was titled I Don’t Believe You Want to Get Up and Dance (Oops!)). The Gap Band III delivered a cluster of hits including Yearning For Your Love, Humpin’ and Burn Rubber on Me. The album was an R&B chart-topper, and reached 16 on the mainstream album chart.

Even when the peak of their success was over, the Gap Band’s music enjoyed a healthy afterlife by being sampled by innumerable artists including Janet Jackson, Snoop Dogg, Public Enemy, Ice Cube and Mary J Blige.

The band dissolved after Robert died of a heart attack in 2010. Charlie, who had beaten drug and alcohol addictions, established a successful solo career. Ronnie, who endured his own “$1,200-a-day cocaine habit”, recalled how he sought help from a higher power by serving in the music ministry of a church in San Antonio: “If you be God, I want you to take this drug habit away from me – save me, and I’ll serve you.”

He is survived by his wife, Linda, and by Charlie.

Ronnie Wilson, musician and songwriter, born 7 April 1948; died 2 November 2021