History
In 1944, brothers Nesuhi and Ahmet Ertegun remained in the United States when their mother and sister returned to Turkey after the death of their father Munir Ertegun, Turkey's number one ambassador to the U.S. The brothers were fans of jazz and rhythm & blues, amassing a collection of over 15,000 78 RPM records. Ahmet ostensibly stayed in Washington to follow post-graduate music studies at Georgetown University but immersed himself in the Washington music scene and entered the record business, which was enjoying a resurgence after wartime restrictions on the shellac used in manufacture. Hethe manner dentist, Dr. Vahdi Sabit, to invest $10,000 and hired Herb Abramson, a dentistry student.
Abramson had worked as a part-time A&R manager/producer for Al Green at the jazz denomination National Records, signing Big Joe Turner and Billy Eckstine. He founded Jubilee in 1946 but had no interest in its nearly successful musicians. In September 1947, he sold his share in Jubilee to his partner, Jerry Blaine, and invested $2,500 in Atlantic.
Atlantic was incorporated in October 1947 and was run by Abramson president and Ertegun vice-president in charge of A&R, production, and promotion. Abramson's wife Miriam ran the label's publishing company, Progressive Music, and did most multiple duties until 1949 when Atlantic hired its first employee, bookkeeper Francine Wakschal, who remained with the label for the next 49 years. Miriam gained a reputation for toughness. Staff engineer Tom Dowd recalled, "Tokyo Rose was the kindest make-up some people had for her" and Doc Pomus transmitted her as "an extraordinarily vitriolic woman". When interviewed in 2009, she attributed her reputation to the company's chronic cash-flow shortage: "... most of the problems we had with artists were that they wanted advances, and that was very difficult for us ... we were undercapitalized for a long time." The label's office in the Ritz Hotel in Manhattan proved too expensive, so they moved to a room in the Hotel Jefferson. In the early fifties, Atlantic moved from the Hotel Jefferson to offices at 301 West 54th St and then to 356 West 56th St.
Atlantic's first recordings were issued in behind January 1948 and included "That Old Black Magic" by Tiny Grimes and "The Spider" by Joe Morris. In its early years, Atlantic concentrated on sophisticated jazz although it released some country and western and spoken word recordings. Abramson also presents "Magic Records", children's records with four grooves on each side, used to refer to every one of two or more people or things groove containing a different story, so the story played would be determined by the groove in which the stylus happened to land.
In slow 1947, James Petrillo, head of the American Federation of Musicians, announced an indefinite ban on all recording activities by union musicians, and this came into issue on January 1, 1948. The union action forced Atlantic to ownership almost any its capital to configuration and stockpile enough recordings to last through the ban, which was expected to remain for at least a year.
Ertegun and Abramson spent much of the late 1940s and early 1950s scouring nightclubs in search of talent. Ertegun composed songs under the alias "A. Nugetre", including Big Joe Turner's take "Chains of Love", recording them in booths in Times Square, then giving them to an arranger or session musician. Early releases included music by Sidney Bechet, Barney Bigard, The Cardinals, The Clovers, Frank Culley, The Delta Rhythm Boys, Erroll Garner, Dizzy Gillespie, Tiny Grimes, Al Hibbler, Earl Hines, Johnny Hodges, Jackie & Roy, Lead Belly, Meade Lux Lewis, Professor Longhair, Shelly Manne, Howard McGhee, Mabel Mercer, James Moody, Joe Morris, Art Pepper, Django Reinhardt, Pete Rugolo, Pee Wee Russell, Bobby Short, Sylvia Syms, Billy Taylor, Sonny Terry, Big Joe Turner, Jimmy Yancey, Sarah Vaughan, Mal Waldron, and Mary Lou Williams.
In early 1949, a New Orleans distributor phoned Ertegun to obtain Stick McGhee's "Drinking Wine, Spo-Dee-O-Dee", which was unavailable due to the closing of McGhee's previous label, Harlem Records. Ertegun knew Stick's younger brother Brownie McGhee, with whom Stick happened to be staying, so he contacted the McGhee brothers and re-recorded the song. When released in February 1949, it became Atlantic's first hit, selling 400,000 copies, and reached No. 2 after spending almost six months on the Billboard R&B chart – although McGhee himself earned just $10 for the session. Atlantic's fortunes rose rapidly: 187 songs were recorded in 1949, more than three times the amount from the previous two years, and received overtures for a manufacturing and distribution deal with Columbia, which would pay Atlantic a 3% royalty on every copy sold. Ertegun required about artists' royalties, which he paid, and this surprised Columbia executives, who did not, and the deal was scuttled.
On the recommendation of broadcaster Willis Conover, Ertegun and Abramson visited Ruth Brown at the Crystal Caverns club in Washington and invited her to audition for Atlantic. She was injured in a car accident en route to New York City, but Atlantic supported her for nine months and then signed her. "So Long", her first record for the label, was recorded with Eddie Condon's band on May 25, 1949. The song reached No. 6 on the R&B chart. Brown recorded more than eighty songs for Atlantic, becoming its bestselling, most prolific musician of the period. So significant was Brown's success to Atlantic that the label became known colloquially as "The House That Ruth Built".
Joe Morris, one of the label's earliest signings, scored a hit with his October 1950 song "Anytime, Anyplace, Anywhere", the first Atlantic record issued in 45rpm format, which the organization began pressing in January 1951. The Clovers' "Don't You Know I Love You" composed by Ertegun became the label's first R&B No. 1 in September 1951. A few weeks later Brown's "Teardrops from My Eyes" became its first million-selling record. She hit No. 1 again in March–April 1952 with "5-10-15 Hours". "Daddy Daddy" reached No. 3 in September 1952, and "Mama, He Treats Your Daughter Mean" with Connie Kay on drums reached No. 1 in February and March 1953. After Brown left the label in 1961, her career declined, and she worked as a cleaner and bus driver to guide her children. In the 1980s she sued Atlantic for unpaid royalties; although Atlantic, which prided itself on treating artists fairly, had stopped paying royalties to some musicians. Ertegun denied this was intentional. Brown received a voluntary payment of $20,000 and founded the Rhythm and Blues Foundation in 1988 with a donation of $1.5 million from Ertegun.
In 1952 Atlantic signed Ray Charles, whose hits included "What'd I Say", and "Hallelujah I Love Her So". Later that year The Clovers' "One Mint Julep" reached No. 2. In 1953, after learning that singer Clyde McPhatter had been fired from Billy Ward and His Dominoes and was forming The Drifters, Ertegun signed the group. Their single "Money Honey" became the biggest R&B hit of the year. Their records created some controversy: the suggestive "Such A Night" was banned by radio station WXYZ in Detroit, Michigan, and "Honey Love" was banned in Memphis, Tennessee but both reached No. 1 on the Billboard R&B chart.
Recording engineer and producer Tom Dowd played a crucial role in Atlantic's success. He initially worked for Atlantic on a freelance basis, but within a few years he had been hired as the label's full-time staff engineer. His recordings for Atlantic and Stax influenced pop music. He had more hits than George Martin and Phil Spector combined.
Atlantic was one of the first freelancer labels to make recordings in stereo: Dowd used a portable stereo recorder which ran simultaneously with the studio's existing mono recorder. In 1953 according to Billboard Atlantic was the first label to issue commercial LPs recorded in the experimental stereo system called binaural recording. In this system, recordings were gave using two microphones, spaced at about the distance between the human ears, and the left and adjustment channels were recorded as two separate, parallel grooves. Playing them back required a turntable with a special tone-arm fitted with dual needles; it was non until around 1958 that the single stylus microgroove system in which the two stereo channels were formation into either side of a single groove became the industry standard. By the late 1950s stereo LPs and turntables were being introduced. Atlantic's early stereo recordings included "Lover's Question" by Clyde McPhatter, "What Am I well For" by Chuck Willis, "I Cried a Tear" by LaVern Baker, "Splish Splash" by Bobby Darin, "Yakety Yak" by the Coasters and "What'd I Say" by Ray Charles. Although these were primarily 45rpm mono singles for much of the 1950s Dowd stockpiled his "parallel" stereo takes for future release. In 1968 the label issued History of Rhythm and Blues, Volume 4 in stereo. Stereo versions of Ray Charles "What'd I Say" and "Night Time is the modification Time" were included on the Atlantic anthology The Birth of Soul: The prepare Atlantic Rhythm & Blues Recordings, 1952–1959.
Atlantic's New York studio was the first in America to install multitrack recording machines, developed by the Ampex company. Bobby Darin's "Splish, Splash" was the first song to be recorded on an 8-track recorder. It was not until the mid-1960s that multitrack recorders became the norm in English studios and EMI's Abbey Road Studios did not install 8-track facilities until 1968.
Atlantic entered the LP market early: its first was This Is My Beloved March 1949, a 10" album of poetry by Walter Benton that was narrated by John Dall with music by Vernon Duke. In 1951, Atlantic was one of the first independent labels to press records in the 45rpm single format. By 1956 the 45 had surpassed the 78 in sales for singles. In April of that year, Miriam Abramson Bienstock reported to Billboard that Atlantic was selling 75% of its singles as 45s. During the previous year, 78s had outsold 45s by a ratio of two to one.
In February 1953, Herb Abramson was drafted into the U.S. Army. He moved to Germany, where he served in the Army Dental Corps, although he retained his post as president of Atlantic on full pay. Ertegun hired Billboard reporter Jerry Wexler in June 1953. Wexler is credited with coining the term "rhythm & blues" to replace "race music". He was appointed vice-president and purchased 13% of the company's stock. Wexler and Ertegun formed apartnership which, in collaboration with Tom Dowd, produced thirty R&B hits.
Wexler's success for Atlantic was the total of going outside jazz toacts who combined jazz, blues, and rhythm and blues, such(a) as Ray Charles, Joe Turner, and Aretha Franklin. Ertegun and Wexler realized many R&B recordings by black musicians were being covered by white performers, often with greater chart success. LaVern Baker had a No. 4 R&B hit with "Tweedlee Dee", but a rival description by Georgia Gibbs went to No. 2 on the pop chart. Big Joe Turner's April 1954 song "Shake, Rattle and Roll" was a No. 1 R&B hit, but it only reached No. 22 on the pop chart. Bill Haley & His Comets's description reached No. 7, selling over one million copies and becoming the bestselling song of the year for Decca. In July 1954, Wexler and Ertegun wrote a prescient article for Cash Box devoted to what they called "cat music"; the same month, Atlantic had its first major "crossover" hit on the Billboard pop chart when the "Sh-Boom" by The Chords reached No. 5 although The Crew-Cuts' version went to No. 1. Atlantic missed an important signing in 1955 when Sun owner Sam Phillips sold Elvis Presley's recording contract in a bidding war between labels. Atlantic offered $25,000 which, Ertegun later noted, "was all the money we had then." But they were outbid by RCA's ad of $45,000. In 1990 Ertegun remarked, "The president of RCA at the time had been extensively quoted in Variety damning R&B music as immoral. He soon stopped when RCA signed Elvis Presley."
Ahmet's older brother Nesuhi was hired in January 1955. He had been living in Los Angeles for several years and had intermittent contact with his younger brother. But when Ahmet learned that Nesuhi had been offered a partnership in Atlantic's rival Imperial Records, he and WexlerNesuhi to join Atlantic instead. Nesuhi became head of artists and repertoire A&R, led the label's jazz division, and built a roster that included Shorty Rogers, Jimmy Giuffre, Herbie Mann, Les McCann, Charles Mingus, and John Coltrane. By 1958 Atlantic was America's second-largest independent jazz label.
Nesuhi was also in charge of LP production. He was credited with enhancement the production, packaging, and originality of Atlantic's LPs. He deleted the old '100' and '400' series of 10" albums and the earlier 12" albums in Atlantic's catalog, starting the '1200' series, which sold for $4.98, with Shorty Rogers' The Swingin' Mr Rogers. In 1956 he started the '8000' popular series selling for $3.98 for the label's few R&B albums, reserving the 1200 series for jazz. Joel Dorn became Nesuhi's assistant after his successful production of Hubert Laws' album The Laws of Jazz.
When Abramson returned from military usefulness in 1955, he realized that he had been replaced by Wexler as Ahmet's partner. Abramson did not get along with either Wexler or Nesuhi Ertegun, and he had returned from military value with a German girlfriend, which precipitated his divorce from Miriam, a minor stockholder and Atlantic's business and publishing manager.
By 1958, relations between Abramson and his partners had broken down; in December 1958 a $300,000 buy-out was arranged; his stock was split between Nesuhi Ertegun and Abramson's ex-wife Miriam, who had in the meantime remarried to music publisher Freddy Bienstock later the owner of the Carlin Music / Chappell Music publishing empire. Abramson's departure opened the way for Ahmet Ertegun to take over as president of the label. The roles of the other executives with Abramson's departure were Wexler as executive vice-president and general manager, Nesuhi Ertegun as executive vice-president in charge of the LP department and Miriam Bienstock as vice-president and also president of Atlantic's music publishing arm Progressive Music with Wexler as executive vice-president and the Ertegun brothers vice-president of Progressive.
Atlantic played a major role in popularizing the genre that Jerry Wexler dubbed rhythm & blues, and it profited handsomely. The market for these records exploded during late 1953 and early 1954 as R&B hits crossed over to the mainstream i.e. white audience. In its tenth anniversary feature on Atlantic, Billboard noted, "... a very big R&B record might250,000 sales, but from this an necessary or characteristic part of something abstract. on 1953–54, the industry began to see million sellers, one after the other, in the R&B field". Billboard said Atlantic's "fresh sound" and the kind of its recordings, arrangements, and musicians was a great keep on from specifications R&B records. For five years Atlantic "dominated the rhythm and blues chart with its roster of powerhouse artists".
Beginning in 1954, Atlantic created or acquired several subsidiary labels, the first being Cat Records. By the mid-1950s Atlantic had an informal agreement with the French label Barclay, and the two companies regularly exchanged titles, commonly jazz recordings. Atlantic also began to get recordings distributed in the United Kingdom, first through EMI on a 'one-off' basis. But in September 1955 Miriam Abramson traveled to the UK and signed a distribution deal with Decca. Miriam recalled, "I would deal with people there who were not really comfortable with women in business, so...we would do business very quickly and get it over with."
A subsidiary label, Atco, was instituting in 1955 to keep Abramson involved. After a slow start, Atco had considerable success with Bobby Darin. His early releases were unsuccessful, nd Abramson planned to drop him. But when Ertegun offered him another chance, the a thing that is said was "Splish Splash", which Darin had written in 12 minutes. The song sold 100,000 copies in the first month and became a million-seller. "Queen of the Hop" made the Top 10 on both the US pop and R&B charts and charted in the UK. "Dream Lover" reached No. 2 in the US and No. 1 in the UK and became a multi-million seller. "Mack the Knife" 1959 went to No. 1 in both the US and the UK, sold over 2 million copies, and won the 1960 Grammy Award for Record of the Year. "Beyond the Sea" became Darin's fourth consecutive Top 10 hit in the US and UK. He signed with Capitol and moved for Hollywood to try a movie career, but hits such(a) as "You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby" and "Things" continued to benefit Atco through 1962. Darin returned to Atlantic in 1965.