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Ahmet Ertegun
1923–2006 · 83 years
The ambassador's son who turned a dentist's money into Atlantic Records
His first childhood memory was the garden of the Turkish embassy in Bern. Ahmet Ertegun grew up inside embassies — his father, Mehmet Münir Ertegün, served in Switzerland, France and Britain before becoming Turkey's ambassador in Washington in 1935. In 1932 his older brother Nesuhi took him to the London Palladium to see Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway, and that settled it. In segregated Washington the brothers staged the city's first integrated concert, at the only hall that would allow it, then brought the players to jam in the embassy ballroom. A Southern senator wrote to complain that a person of color had entered by the front door. The ambassador replied that in his country friends used the front door, and the senator was welcome to use the back.
Atlantic Records opened in September 1947 on 10,000 dollars from the family dentist, Vahdi Sabit, with Herb Abramson as partner. Ruth Brown, Big Joe Turner, LaVern Baker and Ray Charles built it. Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, hired as the first independent record producers in America, wrote and cut the Coasters and the Drifters. Ertegun wrote songs himself as A. Nugetre, his own name backwards, among them Mess Around and Chains of Love. Aretha Franklin signed in 1966 and Jerry Wexler took her to Muscle Shoals, where she found her sound. Led Zeppelin and Crosby, Stills and Nash came later.
The hardest test of his reputation came from his own first star. Ruth Brown put 21 records into the rhythm and blues top 10 for Atlantic between 1949 and 1955, and the label was known as the house that Ruth built. Then she vanished from the business for a decade. She came back and spent years, with the attorney Howell Begle, pressing Atlantic for royalties she said had never reached her, and other Atlantic artists joined her. In 1987 Ertegun sat down with them, the company settled, and he put up 1.5 million dollars to start the Rhythm and Blues Foundation, which paid out to Bo Diddley, John Lee Hooker, the Staple Singers and Brown herself. Atlantic paid royalties when many R&B labels of the period paid none. It still took Brown a lawyer and 30 years to collect.
He chose Cleveland and he chose I. M. Pei. Ertegun co-founded the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and chaired it until his death, was inducted in 1987, and in 1995 the museum's main exhibition hall was given his name. On October 29, 2006, at 83, he was backstage at a Rolling Stones benefit at New York's Beacon Theatre when he tripped and struck his head on the concrete floor. He never came out of the coma and died on December 14. Paul Allen lent a plane to carry the body to Istanbul, where he was buried in a white shroud beside his father and his brother. Led Zeppelin reunited in London a year later to play his memorial.
Lifespan
Ahmet Ertegun's life against the full span of the corpus.
Notable works
-
Atlantic Records
company
Founded with Herb Abramson on 10,000 dollars from the family dentist Vahdi Sabit 1947 -
Chains of Love
song
Written as A. Nugetre for Big Joe Turner and later a pop hit for Pat Boone 1951 -
Mess Around
song
Written as A. Nugetre and cut by Ray Charles 1953 -
New York Cosmos
company
Co-founded with his brother Nesuhi — the club that brought Pele to the United States 1971 -
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
company
Co-founded and chaired — he chose Cleveland and I. M. Pei, and the museum opened in 1995 1983 -
Rhythm and Blues Foundation
company
Established with 1.5 million dollars of his money after the Ruth Brown royalty fight 1988
Life in brief
with age at each point- July 31, 1923 aged 0 Born in Istanbul, the second son of the diplomat Mehmet Munir Ertegun
- 1932 aged ~9 His brother Nesuhi takes him to the London Palladium to see Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway He was nine. He said afterward that he had never heard anything like it.
- 1935 aged ~12 The family moves to Washington when his father becomes Turkey's ambassador Ahmet found his real education at the Howard Theatre in the segregated Black district.
- November 1944 aged 21 His father dies in Washington and the family returns to Turkey without him Truman later sent the body home aboard the USS Missouri. Ahmet and Nesuhi stayed in America.
- September 1947 aged 24 Founds Atlantic Records with Herb Abramson The 10,000 dollars came from the family dentist, Vahdi Sabit. The first sessions were in November.
- 1949 aged ~26 Atlantic gets its first big hit and signs Ruth Brown Drinkin Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee by Stick McGhee, after 22 releases that went nowhere.
- 1958 aged ~35 Replaces Abramson as president of Atlantic
- 1967 aged ~44 Sells Atlantic to Warner Bros.-Seven Arts for 17 million dollars in stock Jerry Wexler later said the price was less than half what the label was worth. Ertegun stayed at the helm.
- December 14, 2006 aged 83 Dies at 83 after a fall backstage at a Rolling Stones concert He struck his head on a concrete floor at the Beacon Theatre on October 29 and never came out of the coma.
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