This article has been edited since it first appeared in print.
The “Love Moods” album, released in 1980 (Image courtesy Don Harrison)
When Harry Jr., Chris, Sandra, Karen and Bruce Waller began their professional careers, Jimmy Carter was president and disco was king.
The sibling act has been known as the Waller Family, the Fantastic Waller Family, the Fabulous Waller Family and the Wallers, but it’s all the same sweet blend of familial soul. “We’ve been to 45 states, two countries and Hawaii five times,” says soprano Sandra Waller Massenburg, the middle sibling in a musical unit that served as a soulful mainstay in Richmond for nearly five decades. “Our secret was that all of us could sing lead.”
“My dad inspired us to sing,” adds sister Karen Waller Ingram. “And that’s what we did a lot in the basement of our home in North Side on Ladies Mile Road.”
In April 1976, 14-year-old Karen won a talent show at Henderson Middle School. The principal, Wallace Seval, recommended the alto singer to Joe Carter Jr., a music producer who was developing local funk and soul bands Poison and Starfire.
(Clockwise from left) Harry Waller Jr., Chris Waller, Harry Waller Sr., Bruce Waller, Karen Waller Ingram, Ruth Waller and Sandra Waller Massenburg (Photo courtesy Sandra Waller Massenburg)
Carter heard a recording of Karen singing over a Natalie Cole record. “He liked it but was unsure,” she says. Then she played him recordings of Harry Sr., Chris and Sandra singing lead over tracks by the O’Jays, Earth, Wind & Fire, and Aretha Franklin.
“After hearing those four voices, [my] imagination went to work immediately,” read Carter’s liner notes on “Love Moods,” their debut LP. “And the next question that [I] asked was, ‘Do you think your siblings would like to form a group and be the biggest and best of them all?’ ”
The producer endeared himself to parents Harry Sr. and Ruth by offering to develop the singers at no charge. Then he got to work, rehearsing them in the family basement for months until they could pull off a solid show that included songs written by Carter and arranger Willis Barnett. “It didn’t take five performances for us to get a label interested in us,” Ingram says.
Their one MCA Records single, “Sweet Disco Daddy,” went nowhere, and the label dropped them. But Carter was undeterred — he had plans. His other groups emulated the soul-funk sounds of Ohio Players and the Commodores, but the Waller Family was designated to be a family band in the mold of the Jacksons or the Sylvers.
The Wallers in Hawaii in 1999 (Photo courtesy Sandra Waller Massenburg)
The Fabulous Waller Family released “Love Moods” in 1980 on Carter’s Dynamic Artists label. The eight-song album of smooth soul and infectious disco, recorded at Alpha Audio in Richmond with Starfire as the backing band, is out of print and now a collector’s item.
Even with a record out, it was slow going. Early tours, with local band Ujimia backing them at first, saw the Wallers losing money. Things changed when Carter succeeded in signing the band to a prestigious booking company, East Coast Entertainment, ensuring them guaranteed fees and lucrative engagements.
They never followed “Love Moods” with another album. “I know it sounds odd, but we were too busy,” Ingram says. “There were occasions when we were on the road 18, 19 days straight,” echoes Massenburg. “We became strictly a cover band.”
Sandra Waller & Company: Iris Burruss, Sandra Waller Massenburg and the late Robert Williams (Photo by Jessica Maida)
For years, the family toured the South and East Coast — with mother Ruth chaperoning — opening for James Brown, Earth, Wind & Fire, and Lou Rawls, among others. The Fabulous Wallers were also a consistent presence on Richmond stages in the 1980s and ’90s at Friday Cheers performances at Festival Park near the Richmond Coliseum. The Wallers became so ubiquitous that then-Mayor Walter T. Kenney issued a proclamation that Aug. 2, 1990, was “Waller Family Day.” They also started to make original music again, issuing the album “Don’t Leave” in 1996.
Around that time, they parted amicably with Carter, who died in 2007. Father Harry Sr. stepped in and took over as manager. “He and my mom were so supportive.” Ingram says. Chris, with the awesome falsetto, took leave in 1989 to explore his own music. Bruce, a solid piano player, left in 1993. “He quit right after a concert and said he couldn’t perform secular music anymore, that he had felt a calling from God.” Today, he’s pastor of an Atlanta church.
Big brother Harry Jr. retired in 2012, and the sisters continued on their same grueling pace for eight years with different male leads. Then the pandemic happened, and their father died. Ingram began having her own health issues, and she decided it was time to step away.
The band performed for Kennedy High School alumni in 2019. (Photo courtesy Sandra Waller Massenburg)
A revamped unit still performs today as Sandra Waller & Company. “We do weddings, birthday parties and country clubs,” says Massenburg, who occasionally sings with returning brother Chris.
The sisters hope for a reunion concert, and Ingram wants to make a documentary. There have been many near misses with bigger fame over the years, but Ingram is at peace with the Wallers’ legacy as Richmond soul ambassadors — the consummate funky cover band.
“In the old days, Joe Carter would sit us down and give us these motivational talks about how we were going to be the best, the biggest band in the world. Obviously, that didn’t happen. But I got to make a very good living playing music all over the country, with my family by my side. I’d say that’s a much better kind of success.”
