Howie Richmond, music publisher died in on May 20th at his home in California.
Richmond represented the interests of songwriters and performers the old fashioned way. His job was to spot talent, promising songs, persuade the talent to sing and record the song, then to get the song airplay, licensing deals with film and TV as well as collecting all royalties. Today multiple people are invloved in the process men like Richmond undertook wholly by themselves.
Richmond was responsible for the huge success of the Lead Belly penned song "Goodnight Irene" performed by the Weavers, who were, Pete Seeger, Lee Hays, Fred Hellerman and Ronnie Gilbert. The song was played was played two million times a day on radio, television and jukeboxes and became a number 1 hit. Other significant artists that worked wth Richmond were Woody Guthrie, Bill Evans, Kurt Weill, The Who, Black Sabbath and Pink Floyd.
