Clive Davis, the music producing titan behind the careers of stars including Whitney Houston and Barry Manilow, has died at the age of 94.
Davis died Monday at his home in Manhattan, his family confirmed to The New York Times. He had recently been discharged from the hospital, where he was being treated for respiratory issues. “He is in good spirits and happy to be recuperating at home,” his representative said earlier this month.
A cause of death is not yet known.
In addition to Houston and Manilow, Davis helped guide the careers of Aretha Franklin, Bruce Springsteen, Janis Joplin and many more across his six-decade career heading Columbia, Arista, and J Records.
Born in Brooklyn in 1932, Davis lost both of his parents, Florence and Herman, in quick succession when he was just a teenager. He moved in with his married sister in Bayside, Queens.
open image in gallery
open image in galleryDavis later attended New York University, where he graduated magna cum laude with a degree in political science in 1953. He then earned a full-ride scholarship to Harvard Law School and graduated in 1956.
He began his career practicing law at a small firm in New York before joining the larger firm of Rosenman, Colin, Kaye, Petschek, and Freund, where he worked with partner Ralph Colin, who represented CBS.
At 28, Davis was subsequently hired by a former colleague at the firm to become assistant counsel at CBS subsidiary Columbia Records. In 1965, he was appointed as the administrative vice president and general manager of Columbia Records, and the following year, amid CBS’s restructuring of its music operations to form CBS Records, he became head of the new unit.
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