They originally called themselves the Greenwood, Archer and Pine Street Band, deriving the name from streets in the Greenwood district. While in high school, Ronnie and Charlie each started their own band, but then merged the two together and brought in Robert on bass. 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. Ronnie Wilson, left, and his brothers, Charlie and Robert, performing with the Gap Band at the 2005 BMI Urban music awards in Miami Beach, Florida, 2005. 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’.” 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 was born in Tulsa, the eldest son of the Rev Oscar Wilson, a Pentecostal minister, and his wife, Irma.
![charlie last name wilson twotter video charlie last name wilson twotter video](https://deadline.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/AP21217034944278-e1629824074722.jpg)
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. 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.īy 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.
![charlie last name wilson twotter video charlie last name wilson twotter video](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Eg3tBlmX0AApkS_.jpg)
Wilson was also co-writer on songs including Party Lights, Yearning for Your Love and Oops Up Side Your Head.