Music Producer Rick Hall Dies at 85

Producer Rick Hall, a Founding Father of music’s “Muscle Shoals sound,” died Tuesday at the age of 85 in his Florence, Alabama, home, following a long fight with cancer. Hall founded FAME Studios in 1959, in the small northern Alabama town that came to draw a galaxy of stars. Among the now-classic Muscle Shoals sessions Hall oversaw: Aretha Franklin’s “Do Right Woman, Do Right Man,” Wilson Pickett’s “Mustang Sally,” Percy Sledge’s “When a Man Loves a Woman,” and the Rolling Stones’ “Brown Sugar” and “Wild Horses.” His work is heard on records by everyone from the Staple Singers, Bob Seger, and the Osmonds to Traffic, Bob Dylan, and the Allman Brothers. His work brought together country, blues, R&B, and gospel influences, and came to the attention of a new generation of music fans via the 2013 documentary Muscle Shoals. Hall wrote in his memoir: “For every hit I have ever produced, I have given three pints of blood and one pint of sweat.”