William Bell -

William Bell (born July 16, 1939) is an American soul singer and songwriter who released sixteen studio albums between 1967 and 2023, including the popular 1977 Mercury release Coming Back for More and the 2016 Stax Grammy winner This Is Where I Live. Bell landed 1968 R&B hits with “A Tribute to a King,” “I Forgot to Be Your Lover,” and the Judy Clay duet “Private Number.” After his 1973 comeback hit “Lovin’ on Borrowed Time,” he scored a 1976 No. 1 with “Tryin’ to Love Two.”

Background

William Bell was born William Henry Yarbrough on July 16, 1939, in Memphis, Tennessee. His mother sang in a Baptist church while his father worked as a laborer and sang with a traveling gospel group. Bell joined a local church choir at age seven and set his early poems to music. Relatives called him “Little Belle” because he resembled his grandmother Belle. He dropped the final e when he adopted the stage surname. Bell attended Booker T. Washington High School in Memphis and planned to study medicine after graduation. His family hoped he would become the first doctor in the family.

Bell won the Mid-South Talent Contest at age sixteen and traveled to Chicago for a weekend engagement with the Red Saunders band at Club DeLisa. Saunders recommended Bell to Memphis bandleader Phineas Newborn Sr., who hired the teenager for weekend dates at Clifford Miller’s Flamingo Room. Newborn featured Bell on standards and jazz material with his fourteen-piece orchestra.

In 1956, Bell formed the Del Rios as a vehicle for R&B and doo-wop material. The Del Rios rehearsed at Bell’s mother’s house and worked Memphis clubs and the regional college circuit. Lester Bihari brought the group to Meteor Records after the talent contest. The Del Rios recorded two Bell originals, “Alone on a Rainy Nite” and “Lizzie,” with Rufus Thomas’s Bear Cats. Bihari released the tracks on Meteor in November 1956 as the first Del Rios single.

Bell sang with Newborn’s orchestra and led the Del Rios across Memphis clubs and Mid-South college dates over the next several years. Lewis Steinberg recommended the Del Rios for vocal work on Carla Thomas’s “Gee Whiz” at Satellite Records. At the session, Bell met producer–engineer Chips Moman, who encouraged Bell to cut a solo record.

On a summer NYC engagement with Newborn’s orchestra, Bell wrote “You Don’t Miss Your Water,” recorded in Memphis for his November 1961 debut solo single (b/w “Formula of Love”), released on Stax.

Discography: