J.W. Alexander
1 record in the archive · 1966
About the artist
James Woodie Alexander II (born 21 January 1916 in Hamilton, Mississippi; died 8 July 1996 in Hollywood, California, aged 80) was a singer, songwriter, producer and manager who was a central figure in the passage of gospel singers into secular soul. He sang first tenor with and managed the Pilgrim Travelers from 1945, heard the young Sam Cooke in 1949 and brought the Soul Stirrers to Specialty Records, urged Cooke's move into pop from 1957, and in 1960 became Cooke's business partner in SAR Records and the Derby label; after Cooke's death in 1964 he managed Lou Rawls and recorded Johnnie…