Ahmet Ertegun was profiled by George W. S. Trow in The New Yorker in a classic piece back in 1978. Ertegun was the son of the Turkish ambassador to the US and he remained behind in D.C. studying medieval philosophy at Georgetown. Instead of devoting himself to his studies he founded Atlantic Records with his friend Herb Abramson. Trow charted how Ertegun moved from tramping through muddy, Louisiana fields in search of hot new sounds to the whirl of Studio 54. Below the cut are links to the songs mentioned in the article, as best as I could find, in the order in which they appear. [more inside]
posted by Kattullus on Aug 17, 2009 - 25 comments

Try a Little Tenderness. Otis Redding owns the song, but it's had an interesting history. Ruth Etting, Bing Crosby [mp3], and Ted Lewis [Windows Media] recorded the song (with more lyrics) in the early '30s. An instrumental version was the opening theme for Dr. Strangelove. Tennessee Ernie Ford did the song on his variety show. And then there was Jack Webb's deadpan Dragnet-style version [Amazon sample].
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posted by kirkaracha on Jul 16, 2007 - 19 comments