While Adam Wade – born March 17, 1935, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania – was a musician, vocalist, and actor, he is best remembered as the first black host of a television game show, the short-lived Musical Chairs (1975). In the early 1950s, after graduating from high school, he attended Virginia State University but dropped out after his freshman year and began working as a lab assistant to Dr. Jonas Salk and his polio research team. He sang and performed in his spare time but decided to leave his lab career behind and focus on a music career. Signing to New York’s Coed Records – located in the legendary Brill Building - in 1959, he was able to work with many of the era’s finest composers, arrangers, and publishers. Between 1960 and 1965, he released 17 singles that made the Billboard charts including his three biggest hits "Take Good Care of Her," "The Writing on the Wall," and "As If I Didn't Know," all of which were released in 1961. Adam Wade also released a series of albums including And Then Came Adam (1960), Adam and Evening (1961) and the Greatest Hits (1962). He left Coed Records and signed a major label deal with Epic Records and released a series of singles and albums that didn’t chart as well as his 1961 heyday. By 1968, his recording career was on the rocks, and he turned to acting, most notably appearing in the 1973 film Gordon's War. His commercial profile was raised in 1975 when he hosted the CBS game show Musical Chairs, becoming the first black game show host on American TV. Adam Wade returned to music in 1977, signing with Kirschner Records and releasing a self-titled album. with an untitled soul album for the Kirschner label in 1977. He returned to acting and performing, appearing in the musical Guys and Dolls (1978), and appearing on many TV show in the coming years. Suffering from Parkinson's disease, Adam Wade died on July 7, 2022, at the age of 87.
