Carla Thomas

During the celebrated fifteen-year span when Stax defined soul music from the 1960s into the early 1970s, Carla Thomas earned recognition as the Queen of Memphis Soul. Born in Memphis in 1942, she joined her father, Rufus Thomas, for a duet in 1960 that supplied the fledgling Satellite label with its initial regional success through the hit “Cause I Love You.” Near her eighteenth birthday she recorded her debut solo single, the teen ballad “Gee Whiz (Look at His Eyes),” a composition she had written several years earlier only to see it turned down by Vee-Jay in Chicago; the track became Satellite’s first national success, reaching the Top Ten on both the R&B and pop charts. Before long the label adopted the name Stax, after which Thomas secured another twenty-two national chart entries with such enduring performances as her answer record to Sam Cooke, “I’ll Bring It on Home to You,” along with “Let Me Be Good to You,” “B-A-B-Y,” the duet “Tramp” alongside Otis Redding, and “I Like What You’re Doing to Me.” Between 1961 and 1971 she issued six solo albums plus one joint album with Redding, all on Stax. In 2007 the complete recording of a 1967 Stax concert she gave at Washington’s renowned Bohemian Caverns finally appeared, featuring an impromptu guest appearance by her father, Rufus Thomas.