However, after doing some online research lately, I have concluded that it can be a rough assignment, even if you are already famous!
Here are a few examples:
— Sam Phillips owned Sun Records in Memphis, Tennessee, in the early 1950s. He gathered and produced songs for a number of singers such as Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, and even a young truck driver from Tupelo, Mississippi, named Elvis Presley.
Phillips was ready to launch Presley's career, but ran into financial difficulties, and was forced to sell Presley's contract to RCA for $35,000.
$35,000?
And look at all the millions RCA later made with Elvis!
The future was not all that bleak for Phillips, though, as he then invested into a rising new company called 'Holiday Inn’ and a group of radio stations!
In 1968 he was part of the first group inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
— Les Paul was a noted guitarist, record producer and innovator beginning in the late 1940s, and was one of the pioneers of the solid-body electric guitar.
In addition, he carried out many experiments with overdubbing (known as sound on sound) tape delay, and multitrack recording.
His system was unique in that he placed an additional playback head on his Ampex tape recorder.
You can check out a video performance of one of his greatest hits, 'How High the Moon,’ by Les Paul and Mary Ford, from 1951.
What a treat!
— Ray Conniff was a big-band music producer working alongside the legendary Mitch Miller with Columbia records in New York, during the late 1950s.
One time, he decided to have a small choir sing-along with the big band using wordless lyrics. the four women doubling the trumpets, and the four men doubling ithe trombones. Miller was so impressed with the new sound that he allowed Conniff to make his own record.
That debut album, including the breakthrough hit,
’S Wonderful, was in the Top 20 for nine months!
Please note that - as in most of his recordings - all of the women stand / sing on the right, and all the men on the left, demonstrating a severely ‘enhanced' stereo effect by gender separation!
— Chet Atkins: Now THERE was a record producer for the ages!
In 1957, he was put in charge of the RCA Nashville division, and quickly and skillfully made country singers appeal to pop fans using the 'The Nashville sound.'
The producer was in the driver's seat, guiding the choice of material, musical background, and getting the most out of studio acoustics and microphone positions.
For more than a generation, he went to produce hundreds of top hits from Studio A / B in Nashville.
A selection of these hits were listed in a previous entry in this journal.
During all this time, Chet was a leading guitarist performing in a variety of styles, from country, to pop and to classical.
As with many creative artists, he disliked the ‘paperwork' and even yearned to branch out into jazz.
After a series of health problems during the 1970s, RCA decided to remove him from his producing duties and replace him with younger men.
In 1982, Chet ended his 35-year association with RCA and soon signed with Columbia records.
(The ‘talent purge’ also saw the firing by RCA of Nova Scotia native Hank Snow, after FORTY-NINE years!)
— Sir George Martin is considered one of the greatest record producers of all time.
As a long-time staff member at EMI records in London, he was also arranger, composer, conductor, audio engineer and musician.
He is sometimes referred to as 'the Fifth Beatle,' in reference to his extensive involvement on each of the Beatles' original albums.
Despite his success - 30 number one hit singles in the UK and 23 in the USA - he had his detractors, including John Lennon, who trivialized his importance to the Beatles’ music.
(Note to Lennon, wherever you are: GET REAL!)
Since he was still on the EMI salaried staff, he never got to share in the Record royalties of their hits, or any others he produced.
So, I must conclude that being a record producer, even one with proven success, can be a mid-boggling experience.
I may be forced to remove it from my Bucket List!
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