Clive Davis, record executive who built Arista and signed Whitney Houston, dies at 94
Clive Davis, the record executive whose ear and instincts shaped popular music for five decades, died on June 22 at his Manhattan home at age 94 , Variety reported.
Davis ran Columbia Records from 1967, where after the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival he steered the label toward rock and signed or developed Janis Joplin, Santana, Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel and Blood, Sweat & Tears. Fired in 1973, he rebuilt his career at Arista Records, which he turned into a pop powerhouse anchored by Whitney Houston, whom he signed in 1983 at 19. In 2000 he launched J Records with $150 million in backing and scored immediately with Alicia Keys’ debut.
Across those chapters he also worked with Aretha Franklin, the Grateful Dead, TLC, Toni Braxton, Leona Lewis and Jennifer Hudson. He received the Recording Academy’s Trustees Award and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a non-performer in 2000. His death marks the end of an A&R-driven model of the music business that has largely given way to data and streaming.