Jerry Wexler, Visionary Music Producer, Dies At Age 91

Jerry Wexler, the famed music producer who worked with Aretha Franklin and Ray Charles, died Friday morning at age 91.

Wexler was found dead at a hospice in Florida, according to his son Paul. The cause of death was Wexler's congenital heart disease.

Wexler worked with such greats as Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Ray Charles, Willie Nelson, Carlos Santana and Bob Dylan.

Wexler produced Franklin's "Respect," Percy Sledge's "When A Man Loves A Woman," and "In the Midnight Hour" by Wilson Pickett, amongst guiding the careers of others as an Atlantic Records executive.

Wexler began his career as a writer for Billboard magazine in the late 1940s where he coined the term "rhythm and blues" for the magazine. Prior to, the songs were referred to as "race records".

While at Billboard, he met Ahmet Ertegun, who started Atlantic Records, which was a small label in New York at the time. When Ertegun's partner was drafted into the military in 1953, Wexler filled in as the label's co-director. In 1967, Wexler and Ertegun sold Atlantic to Warner Bros. for $17.5 million.

Wexler was born in 1917 in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan, just north of Harlem. He then attended Kansas State University and studied journalism, but returned to New York after just two years.

Paul Wexler said the private funeral arrangements will take place in the coming weeks in Sarasota, and his tombstone will read: "He changed the world."

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