Songwriters and record producers Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller created a large catalogue of R&B and rock and roll smash hits including "Hound Dog/Tom Cat", "Little Egypt" and many others in a long career which included stage show music as well as pop singles.
Jerome Leiber was born in Baltimore, Maryland on 15 April 1933. Michael "Mike" Stoller was born in Queens, New York, on 13 March 1933. They met in Los Angeles in 1950 when they were students. They found they shared a love of rhythm and blues and blues music. That year Jimmy Witherspoon recorded their song "Real Ugly Woman" and they began their songwriting and producing partnership. In 1952 Charles Brown's recording of "Hard Times" gave them their first hit. That was also the year they wrote "Hound Dog" which has been recorded countless times. The first version of "Kansas City", "K C Lovin'", was a hit in 1959, when they started producing The Drifters and introducing unusual percussion and other types of musical instrument, which they usually borrowed from museums and colleges, into their arrangements.
They wrote and/or produced more than 70 chart hits and were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1985 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987.
Jerry Leiber died in Los Angeles on 22 August 2011.
Mike Stoller is still alive at the time of writing.
Image: Danny Moloshok | Reuters (2008)
Comments
Post a Comment