Industry Legend Jerry Wexler Dies At 91; Helped Cultivate The Career Of LED ZEPPELIN
August 15, 2008, 15 years ago
Ed Christman from Billboard.com is reporting:
Music industry legend Jerry Wexler, who kick-started his career as a Billboard journalist in the late 1940s and went on to cultivate the careers of RAY CHARLES, ARETHA FRANKLIN and LED ZEPPELIN while a partner at Atlantic Records, has died at the age of 91 at his home in Siesta Key, Fla.
Wexler was born on Jan. 10, 1917, into a Jewish family in the Bronx. After graduating from the school now known as Kansas State University and spending a stint in the Army, he was hired in 1947 at BMI, writing continuity copy for radio stations and plugging the organization's songs.
Later that year a friend recommended him to Billboard, where he was hired with a starting pay of $75 a week. At Billboard, Wexler invented the term "rhythm & blues" to replace the name "race records," which was then the name of the chart tracking such music.
He stayed at Billboard until 1951, when he went to work for Big Three, the music publishing arm of MGM Records. The following year, Atlantic Records tried to recruit him, but Wexler said he would only join if he was made a partner, and nothing happened. A year later, when co-founder Herb Abramson joined the Army, Atlantic came back with another offer and this time agreed to take him in as a partner.
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