Artie Butler

The hitmaking career of arranger and composer Artie Butler embraces the breadth of American popular music from the lady group sound towards the disco era. A onetime protégé from the famous songwriting group of Jerry Lieber and Mike Stoller, his set of credits is normally staggering, spanning a lot more than 100 graph blockbusters like the Drifters’ “On Broadway,” Louis Armstrong’s “Just what a Great Globe,” and Barry Manilow’s “Copacabana.” Blessed Dec 2, 1942, in Brooklyn, NY, as a kid Butler poured over jazz periodicals like Downbeat and Metronome, at several times learning piano, clarinet, and drums. At 13, he got into the brand new York Town offices of Ruler Records on the whim, auditioned for exec Henry Glover on the rehearsal piano and got a record offer at that moment, liberating the R&B-inspired “Lock, Share and Barrel” within the label’s DeLuxe subsidiary in middle-1954. The solitary proceeded to go nowhere, and after a short go back to teenage anonymity, Butler resurfaced when the pianist planned to get a Lieber/Stoller program proceeded to go AWOL. He continued to be a staple of their Brill Building studio room crew for a long time to come, adding to traditional records like the Drifters’ “Through to the Roof” and Ben E. King’s “Gettin’ if you ask me.” In 1963 Butler gained his first task as an arranger, teaming with maker Abner Spector for the Jaynettes’ supernatural woman group basic “Sally, Go Across the Roses.” Later on that same yr, he authorized on like a program keyboardist using the songwriting tandem of Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich, becoming a member of a studio team that also presented Al Gorgoni on acoustic guitar and Friend Saltzman on drums. Barry and Greenwich later on joined makes with Lieber and Stoller to create Red Bird Information, and Butler shows up on most from the label’s blockbusters like the Shangri-Las’ “Innovator from the Pack,” the Dixie Mugs’ “Chapel of Like,” as well as the Advertisement Libs’ “The Son from NEW YORK.” He also teamed with Lieber to create Alvin Robinson’s 1964 Reddish colored Bird launch “Down Home Woman,” releasing his career being a songwriter. After Lieber and Stoller marketed Red Parrot to George Goldner in 1966, Butler continued to be over the Barry/Greenwich payroll, organizing information including Neil Diamond’s early strikes “Solitary Guy” and “Cherry Cherry.” He relocated to LA in 1967 and a calendar year later agreed upon with A&M Information to record PERHAPS YOU HAVE Met Miss Jones?, a assortment of bossa nova-inspired instrumentals offering up-and-coming jazz luminaries including keyboardist Herbie Hancock and bassist Ron Carter. During his A&M tenure Butler also devised the unforgettable piano amount to Joe Cocker’s 1969 smash “Feelin’ Alright,” immediately after departing the label to are a freelancer, getting a decade’s worthy of of pop strikes including Armstrong’s 1970 crossover strike “Just what a Great Globe,” Paul Revere & the Raiders’ 1971 “Indian Booking,” Vicki Lawrence’s 1973 “THE NIGHT TIME the Lights WENT in Georgia,” Neil Sedaka’s 1975 “Laughter in the torrential rain,” Manilow’s “Copacabana,” and Dionne Warwick’s Grammy-nominated “I UNDERSTAND I’ll Never Appreciate This Way Once again.” At exactly the same time Butler also surfaced being a Hollywood composer and arranger of some renown, credit scoring 1972’s WHAT’S GOING ON, Doc? (the to begin many collaborations with filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich) and 1977’s cartoon Disney feature The Rescuers. Film and tv became his principal concentrate in the years to check out, and in 1992 he gained an Emmy nomination for his focus on the CBS miniseries Sinatra. In 2004 Butler reunited with Mike Stoller to compose Laughing Issues, a theatrical musical with lyrics by Iris Dart that premiered in NEW YORK two years afterwards.