When he was a 2-year-old, Clarence Fountain woke up one morning with a case of pink eye. A midwife concocted a home remedy, but the cure proved worse than the infection. The liquid permanently blinded the boy.

“I can’t hold nobody responsible for that, because that was in the day when things was tight and my folks didn’t have any money,” Fountain says. “I don’t feel bad toward them. Maybe they done me a favor. At least I know how to get out and get a job.”

Seven decades later, Fountain is still at the job, and The Blind Boys of Alabama are at the height of their career. Formed in the late 1930s at the Talladega Institute for the Negro Deaf and Blind near Birmingham, Ala., Fountain joined six other boys who opted to take part in a gospel act rather than make furniture for a living.

Three of the original members remain — leader Fountain, Jimmy Carter and George Scott — and the seven-piece band continues to preach the gospel to worldwide audiences.

“Gospel to me is good news,” Fountain says. “Good news that the savior is coming, and you better get ready because there’s nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. You better get your soul right.”

The 73-year-old singer says the musical style has changed significantly since his cohorts first piled into a 1939 Buick and hit the road as the Happy Land Jubilee Singers.

“Now you’ve got contemporary gospel, traditional gospel, jubilee gospel, five-part harmony,” says Fountain, calling from a tour stop in Baton Rouge, La. “We happen to be one of the groups that do very well in singing all the phases of gospel.”

Grammy attention

Although the outfit has continued nonstop throughout those years, only in 2001 did it begin to draw the attention of the recording industry. Since then, the band has earned three successive Grammys, and this year is nominated for Best Gospel Performance and Best Traditional Gospel Album. At the Feb. 13 Grammy Awards, the Blind Boys will perform live alongside soulful rock songwriter Ben Harper.

The Blind Boys of Alabama formed in the late 1930s at the Talladega Institute for the Negro Deaf and Blind near Birmingham, Ala. They will perform tonight at the Lied Center.

While Fountain is flattered to play at the ceremony, he’s also a tad apprehensive about it.

“The people at the Grammys don’t let you pick the song,” he discloses. “They pick it, and that’s always bad. How do they know what I can sing, huh?'”

The ensemble is being honored for its most recent album, “There Will Be a Light,” which is a collaboration with Harper. It’s the latest in a long list of partnerships (which include Shelby Lynne, Tom Waits and Chrissie Hynde) that reveal how the Blind Boys — four of whom are actually blind — have managed to connect with musicians decades younger than they are.

“He’s a good writer,” Fountain says of Harper. “We get along fine. As long as you get along with a person, you can learn a lot.”

Unfortunately, that spirit doesn’t always apply. Take Ray Charles, for instance. Despite the obvious commonalities he shares with the renowned musician, Fountain never connected with Charles.

Audio interview with Clarence Fountain of the Blind Boys of Alabama When the Blind Boys get together with other artists do you discover you have much in common? Do you remember your first day at the Tallageda Institute? What is the worst show you’ve ever played?

“I met him two or three times,” says Fountain, recalling their first encounter was in 1947. “He wasn’t real pleasant. He had a chip on his shoulder. If the guy don’t want to be friends with you, I don’t want to be friends either.”

Expanding boundaries

Like Charles, Fountain was raised on traditional gospel, spending the early part of his career performing mainly in churches. He still considers standards such as “Amazing Grace” and “Blessed Assurance” his favorites. (Even though when the Blind Boys perform “Amazing Grace,” they sing it over the music to “House of the Rising Sun.”)

Despite this obeisance to tradition, the Blind Boys have worked hard to expand the boundaries of their style. In the early 1980s, they took their act to Broadway with “The Gospel at Colonus” (which starred Morgan Freeman).

“We’ve done a lot of things that other groups would never do,” he says. “You got to do something good or something great if you expect to get to Broadway.”

Although touring has taken Fountain around the globe, he remains very much an Alabama homeboy.

“They got the best cooks in the world,” he says. “That Southern cooking — cornbread, black-eyed peas, grits, stuff like that.”

Fountain’s favorite dish?

“I like smothered chicken like a hog loves slop,” he says. “When they make it right and they put that chicken in the gravy and give you some biscuits — that’s good eating all over the world.”

The vocalist may soon be cutting back on doing anything “all over the world.” Fountain mentions 2005 could be his last year of touring.

“I’ve been out here a long time, and everything must come to an end,” he says. “In life there comes a time to put away all things and sit down and rest a while.”

Until that moment comes, though, he insists audiences should take advantage of seeing The Blind Boys of Alabama live, “because we make you feel something that you’ve never felt before: that’s the spirit of God,” he says. “If you feel that, then you ain’t doing too bad.”