Richard Perry, the record producer behind tons of hits from the 1970s and 80s has died aged 82.
From Carly Simon’s iconic Your So Vain, to many hits for the Pointer Sisters, Barbra Streisand, Harry Nilsson and Donna Summer, Richard Perry took many acts to the top of the charts.
Perry died in a Los Angeles hospital on Tuesday after suffering a cardiac arrest.
Perry was briefly married to actor Rebecca Broussard in the late 1980s. From 2009 until 2017 he was in a relationship with screen legend Jane Fonda.
Perry’s career as a music producer began in the late 1960s when he worked with artists including Fats Waller, Ella Fitzgerald, Captain Beefheart and Tiny Tim.
He became an in-demand producer in the following decade helming albums for Carly Simon, Barbra Streisand, Leo Sayer, Harry Nilsson and Diana Ross.
Working with Harry Nilsson he created the Nilsson Schmillson record that contained Without You, Coconut, Early in the Morning and Let the Good Times Roll. Decades after the album’s release the track Gotta Get Up would have a second lease of life when it was featured in the television show Russian Doll.
He worked with Barbra Streisand on her Stoney End record in 1971, taking the singer into the pop and contemporary music realm. He continued working with Streisand for her follow up Barbra Joan Streisand and a live album as well.
Around the same time, he produced a trio of albums for Carly Simon. No Secrets from 1971 contained the iconic hit You’re So Vain. People spent year’s speculating who the song was about. His collaboration with Simon continued on 1974’s Hot Cakes and 1975’s Playing Possum.
The same year he worked with Art Garfunkel on his second solo album Breakaway, before spending the rest of the decade working with The Manhattan Transfer, Dianna Ross, Leo Sayer and Ringo Star.
In the late 1970s he started his own record label and signed The Pointer Sisters. While they’d already released four albums of material, their chart success had been patchy. Their 1978 Energy album scored a hit with a cover of the Bruce Springsteen song Fire.
Perry would produce several albums for the trio giving them hits like He’s So Shy, So Hand, I’m So Excited, Twist My Arm, Dare Me, Neutron Dance, Jump (For My Love) and Automatic.
Through the 1980s he kept producing huge hits including To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before for Julio Iglesias and Willie Nelson, Rhythm of the Night for DeBarge, and Tina Turner’s rendition of The Beatles Help.
Later Perry would produce a series of albums for Rod Stewart that explored the American Songbook.
