The body of soul singer James Brown will be returned tomorrow to the site of his debut — the legendary Apollo Theater in Harlem — so the public that saw and heard him leave a lasting impression on music can see him one last time, the Reverend Al Sharpton said yesterday.

Brown’s body will rest on the stage of the Apollo from 1 p.m. to 8 p.m., and thousands of people will be permitted one more look at a man who steered modern music toward the rhythm-and-blues, funk, hip-hop, disco, and rap beats popular today, said Rev. Sharpton, a close friend of Brown’s for decades.

“It would almost be unthinkable for a man who lived such a sensational life to go away quietly,” Rev. Sharpton told the Associated Press in an interview from Georgia, where he was making funeral arrangements with Brown’s children.

Rev. Sharpton said the public Apollo viewing will be followed by a private ceremony Friday in Brown’s hometown, Augusta, Ga., and another public ceremony, officiated by Rev. Sharpton, a day later at the James Brown Arena there.

Brown, known as the Godfather of Soul, died of congestive heart failure on Christmas morning in Atlanta at age 73. He had been scheduled to perform on New Year’s Eve in Manhattan at B.B. King’s blues club.

Also yesterday, Brown’s lawyer said the late singer and his partner weren’t legally married and that she was locked out of his South Carolina home for estate legal reasons.

“It’s not a reflection on her as an individual,” lawyer Buddy Dallas said. “I have not even been in the house, nor will I until appropriate protocol is followed.”

Brown’s partner, Tomi Rae Hynie, was already married to a Texas man in 2001 when she married Brown, thus making her marriage to the “Godfather of Soul” null, Mr. Dallas said. He said Ms. Hynie later annulled the previous marriage, but she and Brown never remarried.

“I suppose it would mean she was, from time to time, a guest in Mr. Brown’s home,” Dallas said.

Ms. Hynie argued that she has a legal right to live in the home with the couple’s 5-year-old son. “This is my home,” she told a reporter outside the house. “I don’t have any money. I don’t have anywhere to go.”

She said she believes Brown’s representatives were trying to discredit her so that his estate wouldn’t have to be shared with her. She acknowledged that the bulk of the estate was left to Brown’s children, but said Brown had told her she could live in his home with their child as long as she wanted.