Luther Ingram, the R&B soul singer and songwriter, is dead at age 69.
He was best known for his 1972 hit, “If Loving You Is Wrong (I Don’t Want to Be Right).”
Ingram died Monday at a Belleville, Ill., hospital after suffering for years from diabetes, kidney disease and partial blindness.
He and his wife, Jacqui Ingram, had lived in nearby O’Fallon, Ill., for ten years.
Born Nov. 30, 1937, in Jackson, Tenn., Ingram wrote and sang music his whole life. He started out in a sibling group, the Midwest Crusaders, after his family moved in 1947 to Alton, Ill.
He roomed with Jimi Hendrix in New York, performed with Ike Turner in East St. Louis, and was the opening act for Isaac Hayes.
In 1971, he cowrote “Respect Yourself” for the Staple Singers, the biggest hit Memphis-based Stax Records ever had.
