Miami maestro Henry Stone dies
HENRY Stone, the music industry impresario who established the ‘Miami sound’ during the 1970s, died on August 7 in Miami.
He was 93 years old.
The New York-born Stone settled in South Florida in the late-1940s and is largely credited with putting the region’s music on the map.
Stone’s most fruitful period came in the 1970s disco craze. His T K Records unleashed a number of hit songs by KC and the Sunshine Band (That’s the Way I Like It, Get Down Tonight), Betty Wright (Cleanup Woman) and Gwen McRae (Rocking Chair).
Typical of independent record producers, Stone operated numerous affiliate labels which distributed hits like Bahamian group Beginning of the End’s Funky Nassau and What You Won’t Do for Love, an international smash for blue-eyed soul singer Bobby Caldwell.
Stone received the first Pioneer Award from the Dance Music Hall of Fame in New York City in 2004.
