Ronald Isley (pronounced /ˈaɪzliː/ ; born May 21, 1941 in Cincinnati , Ohio , United States ) is an American singer and is known as the lead singer and founding member of the family music group The Isley Brothers .
Biography
Career
Ronald Isley was born the third of six brothers (O'Kelly Isley, Jr. , Rudolph Isley , Ronald, Vernon Isley, Ernie Isley , Marvin Isley ) to Sallye Bernice (Bell) and O'Kelly Isley, Sr . Ronald, like many of his siblings, began his career in the church. He began singing at the age of three, winning a $25 war bond for singing at a spiritual contest at the Union Baptist Church. By the age of seven, Ronald was singing onstage at venues such as the Regal Theater in Chicago , alongside Dinah Washington and a few other notables.
By his early teens, he was singing regularly with his brothers in church tours. In 1957, sixteen-year-old Ronald and his two elder brothers Kelly, 19 and Rudy, 18, moved to New York recording doo-wop for local labels before landing a major deal with RCA Records in 1959, where the trio wrote and released their anthemic "Shout "