Maurice Williams, Singer and Songwriter Behind Doo-Wop Hit 'Stay,' Dies at 86

Maurice Williams ca. 1970

Maurice Williams and the Zodiac's hit was covered by many artists, and featured in 'Dirty Dancing'

Maurice Williams, the singer and songwriter best known for his seminal 1960 doo-wop hit “Stay,” died on Aug. 6. He was 86.

Williams’ death was announced by the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame, into which he was inducted in 2010, and former Zodiacs band member Ron Henderson told The New York Times the musician died in a hospital.

Williams’ signature hit, clocking in at just 1 minute and 32 seconds long, was the shortest No. 1 song to top the Billboard charts, and has been covered numerous times by artists like The Hollies, The Four Seasons, Jackson Browne and Cyndi Lauper. The track is also known for its appearance in the 1987 hit movie Dirty Dancing.

In 2015, Williams told The Charlotte Observer that the song was inspired by a girl he was dating when he was a teenager growing up in Lancaster, S.C.

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“This young lady I was goin’ with, dating, she was over to my house this particular night and her brother was supposed to pick her up at 10 o’clock that evening,” he recalled. “So he came and I said, ‘Well, you could stay a little longer.’ And she said, ‘No, I gotta go.’ I said, ‘Your daddy don’t mind, your mama don’t mind.’ And she said, ‘No, I gotta go.’ So they left. And the next morning I got up and wrote the song ‘Stay.’”

Williams said he called the late Henry Gaston down to sing the song’s falsetto parts, and the song was ultimately a chart-topping hit.

“Just to be on the charts… It didn’t have to make No. 1. But when they hit the Top 10, oh man, I said, ‘Wow, that’s it,’” Williams said. “And then it went on up to No. 1… I said, ‘Okay, that’s cool.’ We were superstars.”

The star first began singing at age 6 at his local church, and formed his first group, The Royal Charms, when he was in high school. Though the group found local success, Williams headed to Nashville in search of a record deal, and managed to woo executives with the song “Little Darlin,’” which he first recorded in 1957 with the Gladiolas.

Two years later, the group rebranded as Maurice Williams and the Zodiacs, and they went on to have additional hits such as “May I.”

Williams is survived by Emily, his wife of 63 years, with whom he lived in Charlotte, N.C.

Emily told QCity Metro that she and Williams met through a mutual friend when they were teenagers — and that at first, she “wasn’t that impressed with the music and stuff.”

“I guess he liked the way I carried myself and the way I thought,” she told the outlet. “I wasn’t running after him because he was a musician.”

The outlet reported that Williams worked for many years in ministry, and still sang in the choir at a local church.

“What am I going to miss about him? Oh, everything,” Emily said.

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