Photo courtesy of NYTimes.com

REPRINT OF ROLLING STONES MAG
By DANIEL KREPS:
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/andre-harrell-uptown-records-dead-obit-996655/

(September 26, 1960 – May 7, 2020)

Andre Harrell, the music executive who founded the influential Uptown Records, has died at the age of 59.

“We can confirm the passing of Andre Harrell,” Revolt network, where Harrell served as vice chairman, said in a statement. “Everyone in the REVOLT family is devastated by the loss of our friend, mentor and Vice-Chairman. Andre’s impact on Hip Hop and the culture and on us has been immeasurable and profound. May he Rest In Peace.”

Harrell’s ex-wife, Wendy Credle, told The New York Times that the cause of death was heart failure.

The Bronx-born Harrell entered the music business as one-half of the hip-hop duo Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde. The group scored some minor hits (including “Genius Rap“) before Harrell began exploring the business side of music.

In 1983, Harrell began working under Russell Simmons and that music mogul’s Def Jam Records. Three years later, Harrell founded his own label, Uptown Records.

“So many can say they are successful because Andre Harrell gave them their start,” Simmons wrote in a tribute following news of Harrell’s death Friday. “He was so beloved because he made his living uplifting others… We celebrate him in his passing because we were so blessed for his presence… He gave everything he had.”

Under Harrell’s stewardship, Uptown Records helped launch the careers of Heavy D and the Boyz, Guy (featuring producer Teddy Riley), Jodeci, Al B. Sure and Mary J. Blige, who as a teenager signed with Harrell’s label. In 1992, Uptown partnered with MCA on a multimedia deal that allowed Harrell to produce films, TV shows and movie soundtracks, including the 1991 comedy Strictly Business and TV series New York Undercover.

“He gave you the best soundtracks of your life man and you didn’t even know it. We never gave him his flowers. He redefined the party,” Questlove wrote of Harrell Friday. “Def Jam was the artform. Bad Boy was the attitude. Death Row was the muscle. But without even knowing it? Uptown was ALWAYS the party.”

Harrell’s onetime intern Sean “Puffy” Combs would later step into an A&R role at Uptown during the label’s most successful years in the early Nineties. However, tensions rose between Harrell and Combs and the latter, after being fired from Uptown, quickly formed Bad Boy Records, taking the recently discovered the Notorious B.I.G. with him.

Combs’ exit signaled Uptown’s decline, and in 1995, Harrell himself would leave the label he founded to become CEO of Motown Records, although that stint was short-lived. Two decade later, Combs would hire his old boss Harrell to serve as vice chairman of the rapper/producer’s Revolt music network.

Earlier this year, BET announced plans for a miniseries based on Uptown Records’ rise, with Harrell in a producer role. In a statement at the time, Harrell said the miniseries would “share my story, the rise of Uptown Records and successful black entrepreneurship, and the management and cultivation of some of the most iconic artists to come out of the late ’80s and ’90s hip-hop, R&B and soul music era.”

“We are mourning the loss of a cultural icon, Andre Harrell, a chief architect of the modern hip-hop and R&B sound,” BET President Scott Mills said in a statement. “Andre was tremendously excited about sharing the origin story of Uptown Records, and its pivotal role in the urban music landscape. With his tragic passing, BET is committed to ensuring that the Uptown limited series event tells both the Uptown story and Andre’s story – that of the incredible music innovator, man and friend to so many.”

Reprint of Rolling Stones Magazine
By DANIEL KREPS
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/betty-wright-dead-obituary-997071/

Bessie Regina Norris (December 21, 1953 – May 10, 2020)

Betty Wright, the R&B and soul singer behind the hits “Clean Up Woman,” “Tonight Is the Night” and “Girls Can’t Do What the Guys Do,” has died at the age of 66.

Wright’s family confirmed to Essence that the singer died Sunday, with Billboard adding that Wright died from cancer in her native Miami. On May 2nd, Chaka Khan tweeted that Wright was “in need of all your [prayers].”

After growing up in a gospel-singing family, Wright released her first solo album — 1967’s My First Time Around — when she was just 14 years old, and scored her first hit at the age of 15 with “Girls Can’t Do What the Guys Do.”

Throughout the Seventies and Eighties, Wright released a series of hit singles including 1971’s “Clean Up Woman,” her most enduring song, “Tonight Is the Night,” “Dance With Me” and 1988’s “No Pain, No Gain.”

In 1975, Wright won the Grammy for Best R&B Song for her “Where Is the Love.” The singer was nominated for a total of six Grammys, including an Album of the Year nod in 2008 for her contribution to Lil Wayne’s Tha Carter III; Wright appeared on that album’s “Playing With Fire.”

Wright’s music also laid the foundation for future hits by other artists: Her “Clean Up Woman” was sampled by artists like Chance the Rapper (“Favorite Song”), Mary J. Blige (her 1993 “Real Love” remix with Notorious B.I.G.) and SWV (“I’m So Into You”), and Beyoncé’s 2006 song “Upgrade U” sampled Wright’s “Girls Can’t Do What the Guys Do.”

In addition to her own work, Wright was also an in-demand studio vocalist, serving as background singers for dozens of artists including Stevie Wonder, Clarence Clemons, Stephen Stills, Peter Tosh, David Byrne and Erykah Badu.

Wright’s last album was the 2011 album Betty Wright: The Movie, an LP co-created by the Roots and featuring an all-star guest list that included Lil Wayne, Snoop Dogg and Joss Stone; Wright previously served as co-producer on Stone’s breakout 2003 album The Soul Sessions. In 2016, Wright appeared alongside Kendrick Lamar and Big Sean on DJ Khaled’s “Holy Key.”

Wright’s husband Noel “King Sporty” Williams, who co-wrote Bob Marley’s “Buffalo Soldier,” died in 2015.

Little Richard
12/5/32 – 5/9/20

REPRINTED FROM: Biography.com 

https://www.biography.com/musician/little-richard

Known for his flamboyant performances, Little Richard’s hit songs from the mid-1950s were defining moments in the development of rock ‘n’ roll.

Who Was Little Richard?

Little Richard helped define the early rock ‘n’ roll era of the 1950s with his driving, flamboyant sound. With his croons, wails and screams, he turned songs like “Tutti Frutti” and “Long Tall Sally” into huge hits and influenced such bands as the Beatles.

Early Years

Born Richard Wayne Penniman on December 5, 1932, in Macon, Georgia, Little Richard was the third of 12 children. His father, Bud, was a stern man who made his living selling moonshine and didn’t do much to hide his disdain for his son’s early signs of homosexuality. At the age of 13 Richard was ordered to move out of the family home, and his relationship with his father was never repaired. When Richard was 19, his father was shot dead outside a local bar.

The childhood that Richard did manage to have was largely shaped by the church. Two of his uncles, as well as his grandfather, were preachers, and Richard was involved with the church as much as anyone in his family, singing gospel and eventually learning to play the piano.

Upon moving out of his family’s home, Richard was taken in by a white family who owned a club in Macon, where Richard eventually began performing and honing his talent.

In 1951 Richard caught his first major break when a performance at an Atlanta radio station yielded a record contract with RCA. But with a repertoire of mainly mild blues numbers that masked the searing vocals and piano that would come to define his rock music, Richard’s career failed to take off as he’d hoped it would.

Commercial Success

In 1955 Richard hooked up with Specialty Records producer Art Rupe, who’d been hunting for a piano-pounding frontman to lead a group of musicians in New Orleans. In September, Richard stepped into the recording studio and pumped out “Tutti Frutti,” an instant Billboard hit that reached No. 17.
Over the next year and a half, the musician churned out several more rock hits, including “Long Tall Sally,” “Good Golly Miss Molly” and “Send Me Some Lovin’.” With his blood-pumping piano playing and suggestive lyrics, Little Richard, along with the likes of Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis, established rock as a real musical form and inspired others, most notably the Beatles, to make a go of it. In addition to his records, Little Richard appeared in several early rock films, such as Don’t Knock the Rock (1956), The Girl Can’t Help It (1957) and Mister Rock ‘n’ Roll (1957).

Later Years

But as his success soared, Little Richard, fueled by his earlier connections to the church, saw his doubts about rock deepen. In 1957 he abruptly and publicly quit performing rock and committed himself to the ministry and recording gospel songs. He recorded his debut religious album, God Is Real, in 1959.
In 1964, following the Beatles’ recording of “Long Tall Sally,” Little Richard plunged back into rock music. Over the ensuing decades, Little Richard would continue to perform and record, but the public response failed to match the enthusiasm that greeted his earlier success.

Still, his importance in the development of rock music has never been questioned. In 1986 Little Richard was one of the 10 original inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He was a recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences in 1993, and a year later the Rhythm & Blues Foundation honored him with its prestigious Pioneer Award.

In recent years, the once-dynamic performer has taken a break from the concert stage. He fell ill during a show in Washington, D.C., during the summer of 2012. The following September, Little Richard suffered a heart attack. He described the incident to Cee Lo Green during an interview in Atlanta: “The other night, I didn’t know I was having a heart attack. I was coughing, and my right arm was aching.’

The singer took baby aspirin, which his doctor credited with saving his life. The deeply religious music icon attributed his survival to a higher power: “Jesus had something for me. He brought me through.”

Death

Little Richard’s agent confirmed that the singer passed away on May 9, 2020, in Nashville, Tennessee from bone cancer.




Pierre A. Evans is a freelance writer of Entertainment, Music, Art, Culture, Fashion and Current Events, and previously for SoulTrain.com, NDigo.com, ChicagoDefender.com, EmpireRadioMagazine.com, and UrbanMuseMag.com. In addition, he’s an author, singer/songwriter, actor, model, poet, dancer, and DJ. He is also the Owner of Pinnacle Entertainment Productions and the Owner/Publisher of GO BANG! Magazine. Follow him on Facebook @Pierre Andre Evans, Twitter @Playerre, on Instagram @Pierre_Andre_Evans.