BARBARA MASON

Barbara Mason is a Philadelphia native who wrote and sang her biggest hit, "Yes, I'm Ready," while still in high school.

She was born on August 9, 1947, and started writing songs when she was about ten years old. In high school, she belonged to a vocal group. Mason’s neighbor, Bill Oxydine, sang with a doo-wop group called the Larks, who made the national charts in 1961 with “It’s Unbelievable.” In 1964, he invited Mason to perform at some of the Larks’ weekend club dates. Weldon McDougal, the group’s bass singer, was producing acts at the Virtue Studio for a local record label, Harthon. There, he recorded Mason on her own composition, “Trouble Child.” It was leased to the Crusader label and quickly faded from sight.

Jimmy Bishop, one of McDougal’s business partners, started his own label, Arctic, with national distribution by Jamie Records. He also became Barbara Mason’s manager. Her first Arctic release, “Girl Have Feelings Too,” went top forty on the Billboard Rhythm & Blues chart in early 1965.

It was her third single that gave Barbara Mason her signature hit. The self-written “Yes, I’m Ready” got to #2 R&B and #5 pop in the summer of 1965 and became a hit again when remade by Teri DeSario & KC in 1979. “Yes, I’m Ready” was an early example of the sweet, lush-sounding music that would be called Philly Soul.

By 1968, Mason had moved on to National General Records, where she stayed for two years. Run by a movie production house, NGR would release an album and four singles on her; but only Mason’s cover of the B.J. Thomas hit, “Raindrops Keel Falling On My Head,” did anything on the charts.

In the early ‘70s, Mason signed with the Buddah label and toughened up her image. She went from innocent ballads of teen-aged yearning to adult-themed songs about sexual relations and marital infidelity. “Bed and Board” and “Shackin’ Up” are good examples. Curtis Mayfield produced Mason’s 1972 take on his song “Give Me Your Love,” which returned her to the pop top forty for the first time in seven years. And 1974’s “From His Woman to You,” an answer song to Shirley Brown’s #1 Soul hit “Woman to Woman,” gave Mason her third of four top ten hits on the Soul chart.

In 1975, she did four songs on the soundtrack of the Pam Grier film, Sheba, Baby. Later that year, Mason left Buddah, after which she turned up on various small labels. She would occasionally make the Soul charts again with songs like “I Am Your Woman, She Is Your Wife” and “She’s Got the Papers (But I Got the Man).”

In the 1980s, Mason shifted her focus to running her own publishing company, but still performed on occasion. She released a new album, Feeling Blue, in 2007. Barbara Mason was still performing as recently as 2016, the same year she was inducted into the Soul Music Hall of Fame.

Charted singles:

“Girls Have Feelings Too” (1965) R&B #31
“Yes, I’m Ready” (1965) R&B #2, Pop #5
“Sad, Sad Girl” (1965) R&B #12, Pop #27
“If You Don’t (Love Me, Tell Me So)” (1965) Pop #85
“Is It Me?” (1966) Pop #97
“I Need Love” (1966) R&B #25, Pop #98
“Oh, How It Hurts” (1968) R&B #11, Pop #59
“(I Can Feel Your Love) Slipping Away” (1968) Pop #97
“Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head” (1970) R&B #38, Pop #112
“Bed and Board” (1972) R&B #24, Pop #70
“Give Me Your Love” (1972) R&B #9, Pop #31
“Yes, I’m Ready” (New version, 1972) Pop #125
“Children of Tomorrow” (1973) R&B #79
“From His Woman to You” (1974) R&B #3, Pop #28
“Shackin’ Up” (1975) R&B #9, Pop #91
“We Got Each Other” (with the Futures, 1975) R&B #38
“I Am Your Woman, She Is Your Wife” (1978) R&B #14
“I’ll Never Love the Same Way Twice” (1980) R&B #53
“She’s Got the Papers (But I Got the Man)” (1981) R&B #29
“Another Man” (1984) R&B #68