Clive Davis, the hands-on hitmaker with a \u201cgolden ear\u201d who brought Janis Joplin, Whitney Houston and Bruce Springsteen to the world and revitalized the careers of Carlos Santana, Rod Stewart and Aretha Franklin<\/a>, died Monday. He was 94.<\/p>\n Davis, most recently chief creative officer of Sony Music Entertainment, a former head of labels Columbia, Arista Records and J Records and a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, died\u00a0at his home in Manhattan, a rep announced. He recently had been hospitalized with an upper respiratory infection.<\/p>\n More from The Hollywood Reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n Through his six-decade career, the music mogul also nurtured such acts as Billy Joel, The Grateful Dead, Alicia Keys, Simon & Garfunkel, Jennifer Hudson, Barry Manilow, Pink Floyd, Earth Wind & Fire, Aerosmith, Blood, Sweat & Tears, Kenny G, Christina Aguilera, Kelly Clarkson and Patti Smith, who once said that Davis \u201chas a weakness for the unique performer.\u201d<\/p>\n Davis was the recipient of five Grammys, including the Recording Academy\u2019s Trustees Award in 2000. Each year on the Saturday night before the Grammys since 1976, he brought together top music executives and artists for a party, held at the Beverly Hilton when the event is in L.A. (The 2021 edition was online because of the pandemic.)<\/p>\n Talking about his ability to identify talent, Davis told<\/a> Playboy magazine in 2013: \u201cI didn\u2019t necessarily have an ear, but I think I developed one. Whether there was a natural ear that was triggered, I don\u2019t know the answer to that. But when you see a Joplin or a Springsteen, you know. And the statistics start mounting and give you confidence. You think, \u2018My God, yeah, I did say yes to Santana.’\u201d<\/p>\n Clive Jay Davis was born on April 4, 1932, to parents Herman and Florence, who raised him in the middle-class Brooklyn neighborhood of Crown Heights. His father made ends meet as an electrician and traveling tie salesman. As a kid, he never collected records but did like to listen to music on the radio. He attended Erasmus Hall High School and was awarded a full scholarship to New York University.<\/p>\n Both his parents died within 10 months of each other when he was 18, his mother succumbing to a cerebral hemorrhage and his father suffering a heart attack. He moved in with his older sister, Seena, her husband and their daughter in Queens while attending NYU and later received another full scholarship to attend Harvard Law School.<\/p>\n After graduating from Harvard in 1956, Davis found frustration working in small New York firms. At 28, he was offered a job in the Columbia Records legal department by Harvey Schein, who would go on to build CBS\u2019 international record business. Davis accepted the opportunity even though he didn\u2019t know much about music, but he took night classes to educate himself on copyright laws, contracts and litigation.<\/p>\n In 1968, his friend, manager, promoter and future fell Rock Hall of Famer Lou Adler encouraged Davis to come to California to attend the Monterey Pop Festival, which the New Yorker described in his 2012 autobiography\u00a0The Soundtrack of My Life\u00a0as \u201ca defining realization.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAlthough I had begun to make some creative decisions at Columbia, I had no idea that I would really be in the business of signing artists,\u201d he wrote. \u201cYes, seeing Janis Joplin perform provided one of the greatest musical experiences of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n He brought Joplin\u2019s band, Big Brother & the Holding Company, and Electric Flag, featuring guitar wizard Mike Bloomfield, to the label, ushering the staid, tradition-bound Columbia \u2014 which under label president Goddard Lieberson had specialized in soundtrack albums like Davis\u2019 beloved\u00a0My Fair Lady\u00a0\u2014 into the rock era.<\/p>\n He famously refused to seal the deal with Janis by sleeping with her, which the bluesy rocker suggested herself, but he did grow his sideburns and begin to wear Nehru jackets in the style of the day.<\/p>\n Davis was named Columbia\u2019s general counsel in 1961, was promoted to vice president in 1965 and shortly after became president. He signed Santana, Joel, Aerosmith, Pink Floyd and Springsteen, revitalizing the label.<\/p>\n In 1971, he booked the Ahmanson Theater in Los Angeles for seven consecutive nights for shows featuring an amalgamation of artists including Miles Davis, Mahavishnu Orchestra, New Riders of the Purple Sage, Johnny Mathis, Loudon Wainwright and Springsteen.<\/p>\n \u201cHis career had just begun,\u201d Davis said of the Boss in the Playboy interview. \u201cHe gets on the stage with his guitar and just stands there. He plays and sings his songs and does nothing else. Emboldened by the confidence I was gaining from my signings, afterward I said to him, \u2018Bruce, when you\u2019re onstage like that you can\u2019t just stand there. You\u2019ve got to move.\u2019 He was listening, but I didn\u2019t think he was really absorbing what I was saying.\u201d<\/p>\n Two years later, Davis caught the singer at the Bottom Line in Greenwich Village and was \u201castonished. This was not the Bruce Springsteen I had signed,\u201d he recalled. \u201cHe was not sitting quietly on the stage. He was not walking around the stage. He was jumping on tables, literally jumping off the stage. After the concert I went backstage and he looked up and said, \u2018Did I move around enough for you?\u2019 He became a great performer, one of the best. But that\u2019s not why I had signed him. I signed him for his lyrics.\u201d<\/p>\n In a scandal that rocked the business, Davis was fired from Columbia in May 1973, accused of defrauding the company of $94,000 in expense-account violations, including paying for his son Fred\u2019s bar mitzvah and a renovation of his apartment. He vehemently denied both charges, and many allegations were dropped. In 1975, he wrote\u00a0Clive: Inside the Record Business\u00a0and plotted his return.<\/p>\n He still had the respect of the artists. Said Elton John in\u00a0The Soundtrack of My Life: \u201cWhen my recording contract was about to be renegotiated, Columbia Records was the only company I\u2019d consider apart from MCA. Then Clive Davis left Columbia \u2014 I wasn\u2019t interested anymore. Clive was Columbia.\u201d<\/p>\n Davis eventually formed Arista Records, named after the branch of the national honor society at his high school, out of the remnants of the studio\u2019s Bell Records label. He inherited Barry Manilow, signed Franklin, Dionne Warwick, Carly Simon and the Grateful Dead and introduced the world to a 19-year-old Houston, who became one of the most successful artists in music history under his direction.<\/p>\n After signing Houston in 1983, he brought her with him<\/a> for an appearance on\u00a0The Merv Griffin Show. \u201cMy introduction of Whitney was that if there\u2019s going to be one performer for the next generation who combined the beauty and lyric phrasing of a Lena Horne with those gospel fiery roots of an Aretha Franklin, it would be Whitney Houston,\u201d Davis told MTV News in 2012.<\/p>\n He took two years to personally oversee her first album, and her eponymous 1985 debut was an explosive, showstopping success with such hits as \u201cYou Give Good Love,\u201d \u201cSaving All My Love for You,\u201d \u201cHow Will I Know\u201d and \u201cThe Greatest Love of All.\u201d (Stanley Tucci played Davis in the 2022 Houston biopic I Wanna Dance With Somebody.)<\/p>\n In 1989, Davis teamed with Atlanta-based label LaFace Records, run by singer-songwriters Antonio \u201cL.A.\u201d Reid and Kenny \u201cBabyface\u201d Edmunds, which resulted in hits from TLC, Outkast and others, and later he partnered with Sean \u201cPuffy\u201d Combs on Bad Boy Records, which released best-selling albums by The Notorious B.I.G. and Faith Evans.<\/p>\n BMG, the parent company of Arista, forced out Davis in early 2000, citing its retirement policy, and replaced him with his onetime protege Reid. But Davis had reason to smile at the Grammy Awards that year, when Carlos Santana\u2019s comeback album,\u00a0Supernatural, was the big winner, grabbing nine awards, including album of the year, record of the year and song of the year. Davis himself received two trophies as the set\u2019s producer.<\/p>\n Supernatural\u00a0went platinum 15 times and has sold more than 26 million copies worldwide. \u201cSmooth\u201d remained No. 1 on the charts for 12 weeks, and \u201cMaria Maria\u201d also made it to the top.<\/p>\n When BMG realized the error of its ways, it partnered with Davis on the joint venture J Records, where he developed Keys and resurrected the careers of Stewart, with the\u00a0Great American Songbook\u00a0series, and Manilow.<\/p>\n In 2002, Davis was put in charge of the RCA Music Group, where he recognized the commercial potential of the new Fox reality TV series\u00a0American Idol. He helped launch the career of first-year winner Kelly Clarkson (winning a Grammy for best pop vocal album for executive producing her\u00a0Breakaway\u00a0album), Jennifer Hudson and Leona Lewis, a standout on the U.K. series\u00a0X Factor.<\/p>\n In 2008, he was named chief creative officer at the combined Sony BMG.<\/p>\n On the Saturday night before the Grammys, Davis brought together top music executives and artists for a party. Music moguls like Jimmy Iovine, Lucian Grange, Sean Combs, Richard Branson, David Geffen and Doug Morris were among the revelers each year, with a top industry figure singled out for their yearly accomplishments.<\/p>\n The 2012 gathering was marred by the death of Houston in her Beverly Hilton room just hours before the start of the party. Davis went ahead with the festivities, turning it into a tribute to the singer.<\/p>\n In 2003, he founded the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music at NYU\u2019s Tisch School of the Arts and later helped establish the Clive Davis Theater at the Grammy Museum in downtown Los Angeles.<\/p>\n In\u00a0The Soundtrack of My Life, he revealed his bisexuality.<\/p>\n Davis was married twice, to Helen Cohen from 1956-65 and to Janet Adelberg from 1965-85. Survivors include his children, Fred, Lauren, Mitch (a concert promoter) and Doug; his grandchildren, Austin, Charlie, Matthew, Hayley, Harper, Sloane, Billie and Cody; two great-grandchildren; cousin Jo; and partner Greg Schriefer.<\/p>\n \u201cTo the world, our father was the iconic music legend whose vision, instincts and relentless pursuit of excellence shaped the soundtrack of countless lives,\u201d his family said in a statement. \u201cHe discovered, mentored and championed the greatest artists in modern music history, leaving an indelible mark on culture that will endure for generations.<\/p>\n \u201cTo his family, Clive was Dad and Granddaddy, the steady presence at the center of our lives, the source of wisdom, strength, encouragement and unconditional love. No matter how extraordinary his professional accomplishments, he never lost sight of what mattered most: the people he loved.<\/p>\n \u201cThrough every chapter of his remarkable life, family remained Clive\u2019s greatest pride and deepest joy. Today, we celebrate not only a towering figure whose influence changed music forever, but the man who led our family with grace, generosity and kindness. We will miss him greatly, cherish him always and carry his love with us for the rest of our lives.\u201d<\/p>\n Best of The Hollywood Reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n Sign up for THR’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Clive Davis, the hands-on hitmaker with a \u201cgolden ear\u201d who brought Janis Joplin, Whitney Houston and Bruce Springsteen to the world and revitalized the careers of Carlos Santana, Rod Stewart and Aretha Franklin, died Monday. He was 94. Davis, most recently chief creative officer of Sony Music Entertainment, a former head of labels Columbia, Arista […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2473263,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25173],"tags":[364487,486260,398472,309195,28851,393667,428652,362274,343913,486707,317385,426045,22530,367072,345177,344586,368922,31190,37098],"class_list":["post-2473262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artists","tag-aretha-franklin","tag-arista-records","tag-barry-manilow","tag-billy-joel","tag-bruce-springsteen","tag-carlos-santana","tag-clive-davis","tag-columbia-records","tag-janis-joplin","tag-jay-davis","tag-jennifer-hudson","tag-johnny-mathis","tag-kelly-clarkson","tag-miles-davis","tag-pink-floyd","tag-rod-stewart","tag-sony-music-entertainment","tag-the-hollywood-reporter","tag-whitney-houston"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Clive-Davis-Music-Mogul-With-a-Golden-Ear-for-Talent.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2473262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2473262"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2473262\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2473264,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2473262\/revisions\/2473264"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2473263"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2473262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2473262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2473262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/span><\/div>\n