Robert "Bob" Shad (born Abraham Shadrinsky; February 12, 1920 – March 13, 1985) was an American

record producer A record producer is a recording project's creative and technical leader, commanding studio time and coaching artists, and in popular genres typically creates the song's very sound and structure.Virgil Moorefield"Introduction" ''The Producer as ...

and

record label A record label, or record company, is a brand or trademark of music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a publishing company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the produ ...

owner. He produced the first album by

Big Brother and the Holding Company Big Brother and the Holding Company is an American rock band that formed in San Francisco in 1965 as part of the same psychedelic music scene that produced the Grateful Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Service, and Jefferson Airplane. After som ...

(featuring

Janis Joplin Janis Lyn Joplin (January 19, 1943 – October 4, 1970) was an American singer and musician. One of the most successful and widely known Rock music, rock stars of her era, she was noted for her powerful mezzo-soprano vocals and "electric" stage ...

). Among his labels were Time Records, Brent Records, and

Mainstream Records Mainstream Records was an American record company and independent record label founded by producer Bob Shad in 1964. Mainstream's early releases were reissues from Commodore Records. Its catalogue grew to include Bob Brookmeyer, Maynard Ferguson, ...

Career

Shad's career as a producer began with working for

Herman Lubinsky Herman Lubinsky (born Hyman Lubinsky; August 30, 1896 – March 16, 1974) was an American radio station and music business executive who founded Savoy Records in New York City in 1942. Career Lubinsky was born to a Jewish family in Branford, C ...

Savoy Records Savoy Records is an American record company and label established by Herman Lubinsky in 1942 in Newark, New Jersey. Savoy specialized in jazz, rhythm and blues, and gospel music. In September 2017, Savoy was acquired by Concord Bicycle Music. ...

and

Al Green Albert Leornes Greene (born April 13, 1946), better known as Al Green, is an American singer, songwriter, pastor and record producer best known for recording a series of soul hit singles in the early 1970s, including " Take Me to the River", ...

National Records National Records was a record label that was started in New York City by Albert Green in 1945 and lasted until early 1951. Big Joe Turner was signed at the beginning and remained until 1947. Billy Eckstine was also a big seller for the label as w ...

in the 1940s, producing

Charlie Parker Charles Parker Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), nicknamed "Bird" or "Yardbird", was an American jazz saxophonist, band leader and composer. Parker was a highly influential soloist and leading figure in the development of bebop, a form ...

in addition to

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the Afr ...

and R&B material. He founded the first of several labels, Sittin' In With, in 1948, where he produced

Lightnin' Hopkins Samuel John "Lightnin" Hopkins (March 15, 1912 – January 30, 1982) was an American country blues singer, songwriter, guitarist and occasional pianist from Centerville, Texas. In 2010, ''Rolling Stone'' magazine ranked him No. 71 on its list o ...

Sonny Terry Saunders Terrell (October 24, 1911 – March 11, 1986), known as Sonny Terry, was an American Piedmont blues and folk musician, who was known for his energetic blues harmonica style, which frequently included vocal whoops and hollers and oc ...

and

Brownie McGhee Walter Brown "Brownie" McGhee (November 30, 1915 – February 16, 1996) was an American folk music and Piedmont blues singer and guitarist, best known for his collaboration with the harmonica player Sonny Terry. Life and career McGhee was ...

Smokey Hogg Andrew "Smokey" Hogg (January 27, 1914 – May 1, 1960) was an American post-war Texas blues and country blues musician. Life and career Hogg was born near Westconnie, Texas, and grew up on a farm. He was taught to play the guitar by his fath ...

Peppermint Harris Harrison Demotra Nelson, Jr. (July 17, 1925 – March 19, 1999), known as Peppermint Harris, was an American rhythm and blues and jump blues singer and guitarist. Originally from Texarkana, Texas, he first recorded in Houston, as Peppermint Ne ...

Curley Weaver Curley James Weaver (March 25, 1906 – September 20, 1962) was an American blues musician, also known as Slim Gordon. Biography Early years Weaver was born in Covington, Georgia, and raised on a farm near Porterdale. His mother, Savannah "Dip" ...

, and others. In 1951, he was named director of

Artists and repertoire Artists and repertoire (colloquially abbreviated to A&R) is the division of a record label or music publishing company that is responsible for talent scouting and overseeing the artistic development of recording artists (singers, instrumentalist ...

(A&R) at

Mercury Records Mercury Records is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group. It had significant success as an independent operation in the 1940s and 1950s. Smash Records and Fontana Records were sub labels of Mercury. In the United States, it is ...

, where he founded the

EmArcy EmArcy Records is a jazz record label founded in 1954 by the American Mercury Records. The name is a phonetic spelling of "MRC", the initials for Mercury Record Company. During the 1950s and 1960s, musicians such as Max Roach, Clifford Brown ...

label. On the subsidiary label he produced, among others, jazz musicians

Sarah Vaughan Sarah Lois Vaughan (March 27, 1924 – April 3, 1990) was an American jazz singer. Nicknamed "Sassy" and "Jazz royalty, The Divine One", she won two Grammy Awards, including the Lifetime Achievement Award, and was nominated for a total of nine ...

Maynard Ferguson Walter Maynard Ferguson CM (May 4, 1928 – August 23, 2006) was a Canadian jazz trumpeter and bandleader. He came to prominence in Stan Kenton's orchestra before forming his own big band in 1957. He was noted for his bands, which often served ...

, the

Clifford Brown Clifford Benjamin Brown (October 30, 1930 – June 26, 1956) was an American jazz trumpeter and composer. He died at the age of 25 in a car accident, leaving behind four years' worth of recordings. His compositions "Sandu", "Joy Spring", an ...

Max Roach Maxwell Lemuel Roach (January 10, 1924 – August 16, 2007) was an American jazz Jazz drumming, drummer and composer. A pioneer of bebop, he worked in many other styles of music, and is generally considered one of the most important drummers in h ...

quintet,

Billy Eckstine William Clarence Eckstine (July 8, 1914 – March 8, 1993) was an American jazz and pop singer and a bandleader during the swing and bebop eras. He was noted for his rich, almost operatic bass-baritone voice. In 2019, Eckstine was posthumously ...

and

Dinah Washington Dinah Washington (born Ruth Lee Jones; August 29, 1924 – December 14, 1963) was an American singer and pianist, who has been cited as "the most popular black female recording artist of the 1950s songs". Primarily a jazz vocalist, she performe ...

. He also worked in pop (with

Patti Page Clara Ann Fowler (November 8, 1927 – January 1, 2013), known professionally as Patti Page, was an American singer and actress. Primarily known for pop and country music, she was the top-charting female vocalist and best-selling female ar ...

Vic Damone Vic Damone (born Vito Rocco Farinola; June 12, 1928 – February 11, 2018) was an American traditional pop and big band singer and actor. He was best known for his performances of songs such as the number one hit " You're Breaking My Heart", an ...

, and

The Platters The Platters was an American vocal group formed in 1952. They are one of the most successful vocal groups of the early rock and roll era. Their distinctive sound bridges the pre-rock Tin Pan Alley tradition and the new burgeoning genre. The ac ...

) and blues (with Hopkins again and

Big Bill Broonzy Big Bill Broonzy (born Lee Conley Bradley; June 26, 1903 – August 14, 1958) was an American blues singer, songwriter, and guitarist. His career began in the 1920s, when he played country music to mostly African American audiences. In the 1930s ...

). Shad formed the Time label in the mid-to-late 1950s and besides the jazz and cocktail pop albums, he had hits with The Bell Notes, and on his Shad label, The Knockouts and The Beau-Marks. He produced

Lou Reed Lewis Allan Reed (March 2, 1942October 27, 2013) was an American musician, songwriter, and poet. He was the guitarist, singer, and principal songwriter for the rock band the Velvet Underground and had a solo career that spanned five decades. ...

's first vocal recordings, "Your Love" and "Merry Go 'Round" for Time in 1962. He also formed the Brent label (primarily for West Coast signings) and had hits with

Skip & Flip Skip & Flip was a U.S. pop duo, consisting of Skip ( Clyde Battin) and Flip ( Gary S. Paxton). They met while attending the University of Arizona in the late 1950s. Career Once known as The Rockabillies, they recorded on Rev Records as The Pled ...

The Chevrons The Chevrons were a United States pop group who recorded the hit record "Lullabye" in 1960. The band featured lead singer Terry Cashman, best known for his baseball songs, notably " Talkin' Baseball", then known by his born name, Dennis Minogue. ...

and Bertha Tillman. In 1964, he founded

, where he both reissued his old material and produced new recordings from

Shelly Manne Sheldon "Shelly" Manne (June 11, 1920 – September 26, 1984) was an American jazz drummer. Most frequently associated with West Coast jazz, he was known for his versatility and also played in a number of other styles, including Dixieland, s ...

Dizzy Gillespie John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie (; October 21, 1917 – January 6, 1993) was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, composer, educator and singer. He was a trumpet virtuoso and improviser, building on the virtuosic style of Roy Eldridge but addi ...

Roy Haynes Roy Owen Haynes (born March 13, 1925) is an American jazz drummer. He is among the most recorded drummers in jazz. In a career lasting over 80 years, he has played swing, bebop, jazz fusion, avant-garde jazz and is considered a pioneer of jazz ...

Blue Mitchell Richard Allen "Blue" Mitchell (March 13, 1930 – May 21, 1979) was an American trumpeter and composer who worked in jazz, rhythm and blues, soul, rock and funk. He recorded albums as leader and sideman for Riverside, Mainstream Records, and Blu ...

Buddy Terry Edlin "Buddy" Terry (January 30, 1941 - November 29, 2019) was an American jazz musician and alto/tenor sax player. He was born in Newark, New Jersey. In the 1960s and 1970s Terry made albums for Prestige Records and Mainstream Records. He played w ...

, and Pete Yellin. His credits in rock and roll include the debut albums of both

and

Ted Nugent Theodore Anthony Nugent (; born December 13, 1948) is an American rock musician and activist. He initially gained fame as the lead guitarist and occasional lead vocalist of The Amboy Dukes, a band formed in 1963 that played psychedelic rock an ...

(

The Amboy Dukes The Amboy Dukes were an American rock band formed in 1964 in Chicago, Illinois, and later based in Detroit, Michigan. They are best known for their only hit single, "Journey to the Center of the Mind". The band's name comes from the title of a ...

Personal life

He died of a heart attack, aged 65, in

Beverly Hills, California Beverly Hills is a city located in Los Angeles County, California. A notable and historic suburb of Greater Los Angeles, it is in a wealthy area immediately southwest of the Hollywood Hills, approximately northwest of downtown Los Angeles. B ...

in 1985 and was buried in the

Mount Sinai Memorial Park Cemetery Mount Sinai Memorial Park Cemetery is the largest Jewish cemetery organization in California. History Mount Sinai Memorial Parks and Mortuaries, owned by Sinai Temple of Los Angeles, refers to two Jewish cemeteries in the Los Angeles metropo ...

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

. Shad's grandson is the writer-director

Judd Apatow Judd Apatow (; born December 6, 1967) is an American comedian, director, producer, and screenwriter, best known for his work in comedy and drama films. He is the founder of Apatow Productions, through which he produced and directed the films '' ...

. Bob Shad's wife, Molly Shad, appeared in Apatow's film ''

This Is 40 ''This Is 40'' is a 2012 American romantic comedy film written and directed by Judd Apatow and starring Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann. A " sort-of sequel" to Apatow's 2007 film ''Knocked Up'', the movie centers on married couple Pete (Rudd) and Debbie ...

'', playing the grandmother of

Paul Rudd Paul Stephen Rudd (born April 6, 1969) is an American actor. He studied theater at the University of Kansas and the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, before making his acting debut in 1991. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in ...

's character. In the Apatow-written '' Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story'', the singer who Cox mimics in his first nightclub show is named for Shad.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shad, Bob 1920 births 1985 deaths 20th-century American Jews American music industry executives Record producers from California Mainstream Records artists 20th-century American businesspeople Burials at Mount Sinai Memorial Park Cemetery