JW Alexander

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James Woody Alexander (born January 21, 1916 in Hamilton , Mississippi, † July 8, 1996 in West Hollywood , California) was an American singer, songwriter , music manager and music entrepreneur. He was a supporter and friend of Sam Cooke and his business partner at the record company SAR Records and the publishing house Kags Music .

life and career

The young JW Alexander was active in the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) in environmental protection, he sang in the Silver Moon Quartet and was a professional baseball in the black show league with the Indianapolis Clowns. He had a varied career behind him before he became manager of the gospel group The Pilgrim Travelers from 1942 , in which he also sang tenor himself. Approx. In 1945 JW Alexander became aware of Sam Cooke, who sang on the Highway QC's as a support act for the Pilgrim Travelers and other major gospel groups in Chicago. Since then, support for Sam Cooke began.

On June 1, 1948, he signed a contract with Specialty Records for his Pilgrim Travelers . JW Alexander advanced to become a gospel talent scout at Specialty and also took on A&R tasks. In 1949 he brought the Soul Stirrers to Specialty, and in the following years the Happyland Singers, the Original Gospel Harmonettes and other important gospel groups. At the end of 1950, the head of the group Rebert H. Harris (1916-2000) left the Soul Stirrers for reasons of faith. RB Robinson, the supervisor of the Highway QC's and baritone of the Stirrers campaigned for Sam Cooke as the new lead singer and found support from JW Alexander. The friendship and promotion of Alexander and Sam Cooke took its course with numerous appearances and recordings.

In the course of the dispute between specialty boss Art Rupe and Cooke / Blackwell , who left the label for Keen Records , J. W. Alexander also took off his hat and subsequently recorded pop records with his newly formed Travelers at the Keen subsidiary label Andex Records - but with modest success.

When Sam Cooke's first success came as a solo artist ( You Send Me , 1957), it was JW Alexander who, with Cooke as a partner, founded the music publisher Kags Music ( BMI ) on July 1, 1958 , in order to share in the success financially to be able to. It even got to the point that Alexander litigated Keen on behalf of Kags for false royalty accounting. The consequences were that Sam Cooke separated from manager Bumps Blackwell, Keen was thus out of business and Cooke switched to RCA . In 1959, when Art Rupe lost interest in the music business, Alexander and Cooke began writing and recording songs for the Soul Stirrers on their own. B. Stand By Me Father , an adaptation of the gospel song by Charles Albert Tindley , which later became known from Ben E. King's interpretation. The next step was to found the label SAR Records together with Cooke. They also founded a second publisher, Malloy (for ASCAP ), and the SAR subsidiary Derby, on which only two LPs by Mel Carter and Billy Preston came out in 1963 .

In contrast, numerous publications appeared on SAR. In addition to the Soul Stirrers, Johnnie Morisette, Johnnie Taylor (Cooke's successor at the Stirrers, who switched to Stax after the dissolution of SAR ), the Sims Twins and The Valentinos . SAR Records existed until shortly after Sam's death and was dissolved in early 1965 by Barbara Cooke, who sold Sam's half. JW Alexander also sold his half on the Kags catalog for $ 375,000. The current owner is Abkco.

JW Alexander devoted himself to accompanying other careers, including that of Lou Rawls (also a member of the Pilgrim Travelers from 1959) and Willie Hutchs. From 1968 he also worked briefly with Little Richard and Solomon Burke . In addition to singing, he also played drums and percussion. Among other things, he supported the Rolling Stones in 1965 with I'm Free . Another mainstay was production. In the 1960s and 1970s he produced e.g. B. the Bar-Kays , Mavis Staples or Isaac Hayes .

JW Alexander died of cancer in 1996. He has a daughter Adrienne and two sons Anthony and JW III.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ SAR & Derby Album Discographies: [1] . Retrieved September 20, 2009
  2. ↑ JW Alexander at Discogs [2] . Retrieved September 20, 2009
  3. ↑ On the death of JW Alexander in the Los Angeles Times: [3] . Retrieved September 20, 2009
personal data
SURNAME Alexander, JW
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Alexander, James Woody
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American singer, songwriter, music manager, and music entrepreneur
DATE OF BIRTH January 21, 1916
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamilton , Mississippi, USA
DATE OF DEATH July 8, 1996
Place of death West Hollywood , California, USA