Charles Kent Wilson (born January 29, 1953),[citation needed] also known as Uncle Charlie, is an American singer, songwriter, record producer and the former lead vocalist of the Gap Band. As a solo artist Wilson’s been nominated for thirteen Grammy awards and eleven NAACP Image Awards (including two wins), received a 2009 Soul Train Icon Award, and was a recipient of a BMI Icon Award in 2005. In 2009 and 2020, he was named Billboard magazine’s No. 1 Adult R&B Artist, and his song “There Goes My Baby” was named the No. 1 Urban Adult Song for 2009 in Billboard Magazine.
On June 30, 2013, BET honored Wilson with a Lifetime Achievement Award that was presented to him by Justin Timberlake. The BET tribute performances included renditions of Wilson’s songs performed by India Arie (“There Goes My Baby”), Jamie Foxx (“Yearning for Your Love”), and Stevie Wonder (“Burn Rubber”) but it was not until Wilson himself took to the stage at the request of Timberlake to perform his Grammy-nominated song “You Are” and then transition into a medley of hit songs performing alongside Timberlake and surprise guests Snoop Dogg and Pharrell Williams that Wilson stole the show during the youth-oriented program.
Wilson is the national spokesman of the Prostate Cancer Foundation where there is a Creativity Award in his name which donates hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to researchers across the country for the development of creative science that conforms to PCF funding principles but is short-term and designed to allow development of otherwise unfunded ideas.