Phillips, Sam

Phillips, Sam (1923–  ) music producer; born in Florence, Ala. He began his career as a disc jockey playing gospel music and blues at radio stations in Alabama and Tennessee. In 1950 he opened the Memphis Recording Service, recording black singers, including B. B. King and Howlin' Wolf, and leasing their material to labels in Los Angeles and Chicago. In 1952 he formed the Sun Record Company, and continued making records by a wide variety of black bluesmen and vocal groups, but he sought to record black material by white singers. Elvis Presley was the first of his discoveries in this new "rockabilly" style, and he released the singer's first ten songs before selling his contract to RCA for the then exceptional sum of $35,000. His subsequent discoveries included Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Charlie Rich, and Roy Orbison. Phillips sold his controlling interest in Sun Records in 1969.