Art Rupe, music executive of Specialty Records, dies aged 104

NEW YORK – Musical CEO Art Rupe, whose Specialty Records was a leading record label during rock ‘n roll’s formative years and helped launch the careers of Little Richard, Sam Cooke and many others , passed away. He is 104 years old.

Rupe, who was inducted into the Rock Hall of Fame in 2011, died Friday at his home in Santa Barbara, California, according to the Arthur N. Rupe Foundation. The organization did not disclose the cause of his death.

Greensburg, Pennsylvania, home to contemporaries of Jerry Wexler, Leonard Chess, and other white business-producers who helped bring Black music to a general audience. He founded Specialty in Los Angeles in 1946 and gave artists such as Cooke and his gospel group, The Soul Stirrers, Little Richard, Lloyd Price, John Lee Hooker and Clifton Chenier an early respite.

Music historian Billy Vera writes: “The development of Specialty Records paralleled, and perhaps defined, the development of Black popular music, from the ‘racial’ music of the years. 1940 to the rock n’ roll of the 1950s,” wrote music historian Billy Vera in the lining note for “The Special Story,” a five-CD set released in 1994.

Rupe’s most lucrative and important signing was Little Richard, a rhythmic blues and gospel performer since his teens who had struggled to break through commercially. In a 2011 interview for the Rock Hall archives, Rupe explained that Little Richard (career name of the late Macon, Georgia, native Richard Penniman) learned about Specialty through Price, submitted a demo, and for months tried to find out if anyone had heard. Finally, he asked to speak to Rupe, who dug his tape out of the refuse pile.

“There’s something about Little Richard’s voice that I like,” Rupe said. “I don’t know – it’s too exaggerated, too emotional. And I said, “Give this guy a chance and maybe we can make him sing like BB King.”

The recording sessions weren’t very exciting at first, but during a lunch break at a nearby inn, Little Richard sat down at the piano and played a song he’d been performing during his days there. club: “Tutti Frutti,” with the immortal opening shout, “A-wop- bop-a-loo-mop-a-wop-bam-boom! ”

Released in September 1955 and one of rock n’ roll’s first major hits, “Tutti Frutti” was a euphoric, but clearer version of the vulgar original, featured with rhyming rhymes. tunes like “Tutti Frutti / good booty.” Rupe notes that Little Richard’s performance was transformed when he accompanies the piano himself.

“Up until that point, Bumps (producer Robert “Bumps” Blackwell) let Little Richard just be a singer,” Rupe said. “The neck bone connects to the knee bone or something; his voice and his playing style raised the bar. “

Critic Langdon Winner would liken Little Richard’s Specialty recordings to Elvis Presley’s Sun Records sessions to “the model of singing and musical prowess that have inspired rock musicians ever since. “

Little Richard’s other hits with Specialty included rock classics like “Long Tall Sally,” “Good Golly Miss Molly,” and “Rip it Up” before he abruptly (and temporarily) retired. in 1957. Specialty is also home to “Lawdy Miss Clawdy”” (With Fats Domino on piano); Don and Dewey’s “Farmer John”; “Dizzy Miss Lizzy” by Larry Williams, which the Beatles later covered; and the music of leading gospel hits like Dorothy Love Coates, Swan Silvertones and Pilgrim Travelers.

Rupe was known for his underpaying of his artists and for engaging in an exploitative practice common among label owners in early rock: Letting performers sign the contract leaves him with most or all of the royalties and publishing rights. Little Richard sued him in 1959 for royalties and settled out of court for $11,000.

At the same time, Rupe grew increasingly frustrated with the “payola” system that bribed TV stations to get records and distanced himself from the music business. He sold Specialty to Fantasy Records in the early 1990s, but continued to make money investing in oil and gas. In recent years, he heads the Art N. Rupe Foundation, which supports education and research to shine “light of truth on important and controversial issues.”

Rupe’s survivors include his daughter, Beverly Rupe Schwarz, and niece Madeline Kahan.

He was born Arthur Goldberg, the son of a Jewish factory worker, whose passion for Black music began with listening to singers at a nearby Baptist church. He studied at the University of California, Los Angeles, briefly considering a career in film and instead decided to take up music, educating himself by buying a “race record” and listening with a metronome and stopwatch. He co-founded Juke Box Records in the mid-1940s, but soon left to start Specialty. He also changed his surname to Rupe, the family ancestral surname.

Rupe’s discerning taste helped him succeed, but cost him at least one major hit. In the mid-1950s, Cooke was eager to expand his appeal beyond the gospel and recorded a number of pop songs at the Specialty, including a ballad that became the standard, “You Send Me.” Rupe found the song bland and was horrified by its white backup singers. He let Cooke and Blackwell, who became Cooke’s manager, buy the rights and release “You Send Me” through RCA.

“I didn’t think ‘You Send Me’ was that great. I knew it would have a certain intrinsic value because Sam was so good. I never dreamed it would be a million-dollar seller,” said Rupe, who added, sarcastically, “My part is a great genius. ”

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