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Why The Ray

Other arms reach out to me Other eyes smile tenderly Still in peaceful dreams I see The road leads back to you

Legendary musician Ray Charles brought new life to that old, sweet song that keeps Georgia on people’s minds. Anyone who experiences his soulful delivery of Georgia’s state song will feel a pull to this Southerly locale. Charles, an Albany native, couldn’t see — he contracted glaucoma ag age six and went blind thereafter — but I like to think that his hometown of Albany was in his mind’s eye as he delivered these special words.

For Albany is indeed special. A place rooted in history, in culture, in industry, in nature, in progress. A place at the bottom of the map to which all roads lead. A place about which no one forgets. A place home to one of Georgia’s seven natural wonders, a place about which people wonder and a place that offers opportunities to wander.

This magazine, published by the Albany Area Chamber for many years, is a tribute to Albany. A field guide to the community and her people. With our 2022 edition launch, we've aptly renamed the popular publication The Ray. Our most famous Ray is centrally featured in this edition’s striking cover art, commissioned by the Chamber and produced specifically for this issue of The Ray by Albany State University Professor of Art Chazz Williams, whose intricate and kaleidoscopic work showcases uniquely Albany scenes and inspires curiosity to learn, to interpret, to decipher. It's a piece that captures attention immediately, and lingers lightly in the mind, nudging the viewer to revisist, re-examine, reexplore its layered scenes from the Flint RiverQuarium's albino alligator, Moonshine, to the Arctic Bear's iconic sign; from the Bridge House designed by freed slave Horace King to the stained glass windows of historic Old Mt. Zion Church, where Martin Luther King Jr. preached and led a movement. I hope you appreciate this spectacular and authentically Albany work of art, and enjoy discovering its stories, histories and nuances.

“I never wanted to be famous. I only wanted to be great,” Ray once said.

Through The Ray, we aim to stream light onto that and those building greatness in and around Albany. Stories of people, stories of innovation, stories of community. Stories of what led us to where we are and stories of what’s leading us to where we’re going. Stories of who we are and what we are and what together we can be.

At the Albany Area Chamber and throughout our community, we, too, strive to be great − for our citizens, our visitors, our businesses, our generations present and our generations to come. Great for the young and the old, the native and the transplant, the small business and the global industry. Our goal, too, is great though simple: To build a community in which people want to live and businesses want to invest.

It is our hope that through The Ray, you discover and feast on what is sweetly, authentically Albany.

Just an old, sweet song Keeps Albany, Georgia, on my mind

Songwriters: Hoagy Carmichael / Stuart Gorell

Bárbara Rivera Holmes President & CEO, Editor In Chief bholmes@albanyga.com