The Record Man

 

It goes without saying that there are few non-musicians as important to American music in the 20th Century than John Hammond was.

 

A record producer, talent scout and archivist, he discovered and nurtured a veritable Who's Who of Popular Music. Honestly, having discovered just one of these performers would have ensured Hammond a piece of immortality. But over the course of fifty years, he kept moving from strength to strength, finding new talent who more often as not went on to change the culture in profound ways.

 

Need proof? Okay, here's an incomplete list of the artists John Hammond found and recorded:

 

Count Basie

Billie Holiday

Benny Goodman

Fletcher Henderson

Harry James

Charlie Christian

Pete Seeger

Big Joe Turner

Bob Dylan

Aretha Franklin

Bruce Springsteen

George Benson

Leonard Cohen

Stevie Ray Vaughan

 

Additionally, in 1961, he saved the recordings of Blues pioneer Robert Johnson from obscurity, and convinced Columbia Records to re-release them, helping to spark the Blues boom of the Sixties, and elevating Johnson to his rightful place as a founding father of a quintessential American music form.

 

Still working well into his seventies, Hammond was finally felled by a series of strokes. When he died, he was listening to the music of Billie Holiday.