Ronald Bell, Kool & the Gang co-founder behind hit songs Jungle Boogie and Celebration – obituary

Ronald Bell, the saxophonist and singer who has died aged 68, was a founder member of Kool & the Gang, the American R & B group whose worldwide hits in the 1970s and 1980s – many of them written and produced by Bell – include Jungle Boogie, Get Down On It, Cherish and the party anthem Celebration.

Bell was surrounded by musical influences from childhood onwards. Born in Youngstown, Ohio, on November 1 1951, he moved with his family to Jersey City when he was nine. There, his older brother Robert adopted the street nickname “Kool”.

Their father Bobby was a former Golden Gloves bantamweight boxing champion and, having turned professional, came to know many musicians who led a similarly itinerant life. He was a jazz fan – the boys’ mother sang in a church choir – and he became friendly with Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk, who was Robert’s godfather.

When they turned to music themselves, initially Ronald and Robert only had paint cans to use as drums. They would play on a pitch by the subway in Greenwich Village, making, Ronald recalled, “about $5 in three weeks”. He started what would become Kool & the Gang with his brother and five friends from Lincoln High School when he was about 13.

The group went through several incarnations before settling on its final name, and at first played jazz with the likes of Pharaoh Sanders and then alongside Latin acts such as Willie Colón. One of the hallmarks of the band’s sound would be the jazzy interplay and improvisation of its members even as it evolved from funk to smoother soul.

Having won an amateurs’ night at the Apollo Theatre, and increasingly influenced by James Brown, the group began to release records in the late 1960s. They first made a significant mark on the charts with their 1973 LP Wild & Peaceful, which included the hit Jungle Boogie (later used memorably by Quentin Tarantino in the film Pulp Fiction). Vocalised by their sharp-dressed roadie, Don Boyce, it featured the horns which would become their signature.

The track was largely written by Ronald Bell, who was adept at crafting the frisky hooks and fills that gave the band’s music much of its danceable rhythm. Even his lesser-known album tracks were to have a lengthy legacy when sampled by a later generation of musicians. Bell’s own saxophone playing was chiefly influenced by that of John Coltrane.

After the early success of singles such as Hollywood Swinging (1974), Kool & the Gang endured several lean years as funk gave way to disco, although they won a share of a Grammy after Open Sesame was included on the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack.

Their fortunes changed after they recruited, for the first time, a full-time singer, James “J T” Taylor, whose range included the ballads they had previously shied away from. Their renaissance began with Ladies Night in 1979, its title derived from Robert telling Ronald about an evening spent at the Studio 54 nightclub.

Less secularly, the idea for Celebration, which in 1981 became their only US No 1, was inspired by a passage that Ronald, who was a Muslim and also went by the name of Khalis Bayyan, came across in the Koran. It was played regularly on the radio at the time to mark the release of the American embassy hostages by Iran.

Working with producer Eumir Deodato, the band enjoyed a run of seven consecutive gold and platinum albums, notably Emergency (1984) and in the first half of the 1980s had more Top 40 single successes than Michael Jackson, Prince or Lionel Richie.

They were particularly popular in Britain, where they scored seven Top 10 hits in that period, among them Joanna, Cherish and Fresh. In 1985, they appeared on the Band Aid charity single after Bob Geldof ran into them when they happened to be at the offices of their label in London as he was putting together the line-up for the record.

When hip-hop emerged, and after Taylor left the group, its star faded, although they continued to tour and sporadically to release records. Kool for the Holidays, their 23rd and final LP, came out in 2013. By then, somewhat improbably, they were the opening act for ’80s rockers Van Halen, whose frontman, David Lee Roth, had seen them play Glastonbury and noted that more than half of his band’s own audience was female.

Bell also worked as a producer, for instance on the Fugees’ first LP Blunted on Reality (1994), and enjoyed spotting samples of his work being used by, among others, MARRS, DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, Luniz, and, notably, on Public Enemy’s epoch-shaping Fear of a Black Planet (1990). He was elected to the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2018.

Ronald Bell is survived by his wife Tia and by 10 children.

Ronald Bell (Khalis Bayyan), born November 1 1951, died September 9 2020