The life and times of the Hardest Working Man in Showbusiness

1933

Born in a shack near Barnwell, South Carolina, across the Savannah River from Augusta, Georgia, Baby James, like Jimi Hendrix after him, is part African-American, part Native American.

1944

Eleven-year-old Brown wins a talent contest and forms his first group, the Cremona Trio.

1948

Brown is convicted of theft, aged 15, and sentenced to eight to 16 years in a Georgia reform school, where he forms a gospel quartet. He is paroled after serving three years, partly at the instigation of his new friend Bobby Byrd's family.

1953

Marries his first wife Velma Warren (below) in Toccoa Trinity Church (divorced in 1969).

1955

Brown records demo of "Please, Please, Please" with the Famous Flames in Macon, Georgia.

1956

Signed to King/ Federal Records, the group re-cut "Please, Please, Please" and release it. Reaches number 5 in the US R&B chart.

1959

Hits the R&B number one spot for the first time with "Try Me".

1960-62

Relentless success with "Think", "Bewildered", "I Don't Mind", "Baby, You're Right", "Lost Someone" and "Night Train" clogging the R&B top 20.

1962

The Live at the Apollo album is recorded at the famous Harlem theatre. An instant classic introducing the domestic audience to unprecedented levels of audience-related R&B heat.

1963

"Prisoner of Love" gives JB his first major crossover hit.

1964

Whipcracking TV performance on The TAMI Show (right) brings the JB shimmy into every livingroom. Described as the greatest rock'n'roll performance ever. Brown puts corporate noses out of joint by releasing music on his own label, Smash, despite his existing contract with King.

1965-66

A first British hit: "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag". English mods discover a new way to appreciate themselves. Biggest hit yet with the histrionic ballad, "It's a Man's Man's Man's World".

1967

"Give the drummer some!" Cold Sweat (left) signals a hardening of Brown's nochord- changes rhythmic stance' cracks both pop and R&B top tens.

1968

JB entertains troops in Vietnam (left) and talks on Washington radio to calm unrest following the assassination of Martin Luther King. Dines with President Lyndon B Johnson.

1970

Marries his second wife, Deirdre Jenkins (right). "Get Up (I Feel Like Being A) Sex Machine" defines Brown's new ultra funky, faintly dissonant musical direction. Brown is now the razor's edge in black American dance music. Interest is shown by Miles Davis...

1971

Signs to Polydor Records and debuts his backing band, The JBs, featuring trombonist Fred Wesley and saxophonist Maceo Parker. Bassist Bootsy Collins and brother Catfish depart the fold to embrace the funkadelic cosmos of George Clinton.

1973

Oldest son Teddy (below) is killed in a car crash. The Soul Brother No 1 goes celluloid, with soundtracks for two films, Black Caesar and Slaughter's Big Rip-Off.

1974

Three successive R&B number ones, in the shape of "The Payback", "My Thang" and "Papa Don't Take No Mess". His last great commercial run.

1979

The Hardest Working Man in Showbusiness/Godfather of Soul/ Minister of the New New Super Heavy Funk metamorphoses into The Original Disco Man (left). Just too late for disco.

1980

Cameo appearance as the Rev Cleophus in the John Belushi film The Blues Brothers (left).

1984

Marries his third wife, make-up artist Adrienne Rodriguez (who died in 1996)

1986

Has an international hit with 'Living in America', the theme song to Rocky IV. The retrospective In the Jungle Groove album highlights Clyde Stubblefield's deathless "Funky Drummer" break, which goes on to become the most sampled breakbeat in history.

1988

Brown is arrested after a car chase and charged with felonies involving firearms, drugs, violence and bonkers driving. He is sentenced to six-and-a-half years but is released in 1991.

2002

Marries Tomi Rae Hynie, a singer of Norwegian descent. The couple, who have a fiveyear- old son, are planning to release an album of duets.

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