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Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the Jerry Wexler Collection #20393, Southern Folklife Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Acquisitions Information

Received from Jerry Wexler on 1 November 2004 and 6 December 2004

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

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• Atlantic Recording Corporation.
• Burke, Solomon.
• Charles, Ray, 1930-
• Cooke, Sam.
• Franklin, Aretha.
• Jones, Quincy, 1933-
• Musicals--United States.
• Rhythm and blues music.
• Rock music.
• Soul music.
• Sound recording executives and producers--United States--History--20th century.
• Sound recording industry--United States--History--20th century.
• Springfield, Dusty.
• Stax Records.
• Wexler, Jerry.

Jerry Wexler was born 10 January 1917 in New York City and grew up in Washington Heights. Early on, he gravitated towards sports and jazz music. Wexler graduated from high school at age 15 and enrolled at Kansas State College of Agriculture and Applied Science where he obtained a degree in journalism. He served in the United States Army and was stationed in Florida and Texas. After the Army and a job with BMI, he was hired as a reporter for Billboard Magazine. At Billboard, Wexler suggested "rhythm and blues" as a name change for "race records,"  Billboard's rubric for black music.

Attending jazz clubs and postwar jam sessions, Wexler met Ahmet Ertegun and Herb Abramson, founders of Atlantic Records, an independent record label specializing in rhythm and blues. When Abramson went into the Army, Wexler joined Atlantic as a partner.

During different periods of his career Wexler had two main co-producers, Ahmet Ertegun and Barry Beckett, a southern piano player. In the 1950s, Wexler produced or co-produced recordings by LaVern Baker, Ruth Brown, Ray Charles, the Drifters, and Big Joe Turner. During the 1960s, Wexler relocated much of his production work from New York City to Stax in Memphis, Tenn., and Fame in Muscle Shoals, Ala. He produced or co-produced artists including Solomon Burke, Cher, Wilson Pickett, Aretha Franklin, and Dusty Springfield. Wexler and Franklin worked together into the 1970s, and it was during Franklin's stay at Atlantic that she recorded the body of work for which she is best known.

In 1975, Wexler resigned from Atlantic, but continued producing records in Miami at Criteria Studios, where he had set up "Atlantic South." In the 1970s and 1980s, Wexler worked with a number of significant artists including Dr. John, Doug Sahm, Willie Nelson, Bob Dylan, and Carlos Santana. He also produced the musical One Mo' Time, the original cast recording of The Wiz, and the motion picture soundtracks to Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life is Calling and Pretty Baby. His soundtrack for Pretty Baby received an Academy Award nomination in 1979. As a record producer, Jerry Wexler helped create a greatly influential corpus of classic rhythm and blues, rock and roll, and soul music. Wexler was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987. He and David Ritz wrote Rhythm and the Blues: A Life in American Music (Knopf, 1993).

The collection is composed of material that Jerry Wexler collected documenting his life and career as music producer specializing in rhythm and blues, rock and roll, and soul music. It includes scrapbooks chiefly containing newspaper clippings concerning Wexler, musicians and producers with whom he associated, and the 1979 musical One Mo' Time, which he produced. Musicians documented in these clippings include Aretha Franklin, Solomon Burke, Sam Cooke, Ray Charles, and Dusty Springfield. Other materials include articles and speeches Wexler wrote, commercial and non-commercial audio recordings and video recordings, and a biographical poster. Among these materials are a photocopy of Aretha Franklin's session notes during the recording of her 1970 release Spirit in the Dark (1970), Wexler's Grammy nomination card as producer of the original cast recording of The Wiz, and a handwritten note to Wexler from Quincy Jones wishing him a happy new year in 1980.

• CDs (CD-4559-CD-4640)
• Videotapes (VHS-207-VHS-219)
• DVDs (DVD-102-DVD-103)
• Oversize papers (OP-30393/1)