Maurice Williams & The Zodiacs - "May I"

Maurice Williams, the iconic singer and songwriter and lead singer of the Zodiacs passed away at the age of 86 this month in Charlotte, NC. Boris in Lancaster South Carolina he formed his first group in high school called the Royal Charms. The got their first recording contract from Nashville based Excello and were renamed the Gladiolas by Excello records boss Ernie Young. Their release of “Little Darlin” written by Williams and released in 1957 made it to number 11 on the R&B charts and number 41 on the pop charts. A white group called the Diamonds from Canada quickly re-recorded the song and took it to number 2 on the pop charts but Maurice never seemed to mind since he owned the songwriting rights and got paid well at the age of 17 based on their recording. It was also later featured in the 1973 movie “American Graffiti”
By 1959 they had left Excello Records and renamed themselves after a British built Ford Zodiac car. They recorded a series of demos in Columbia South Carolina and took them to New York. The head of Herald/Ember records immediately zeroed in on a tune Maurice had written about a girl named Mary he dated when he was 15 years old - “Stay” became their biggest hit and peaked at number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1960. Ironically it hit the Billboard Hot 100 again in 1987 when it was featured on the soundtrack of the movie “Dirty Dancing”
Perhaps my favorite Zodiacs tune was released in 1965 when they had followed Marshall Seahorn from Concord NC to the Dee-Su label based out of New Orleans - “May I” is an all time Carolina Beach Music and Shag classic. Here is Maurice singing his Carolina jukebox classic - “May I”
RIP Maurice
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