Percy Sledge

Genres:	Country & Bluegrass • Music Videos & Concerts • R&B / Soul
Descriptive "tags":	soul • 60s • blues • rhythm and blues • oldies
Decades Active:	1960s • 1970s • 1980s • 1990s • 2000s
Links online:	IMDb • Official Homepage • Wikipedia

Biography

25 November 1941, Leighton, Alabama, USA. An informal, intimate singer, former hospital nurse Sledge led a popular campus attraction, the Esquires Combo, prior to his recording debut. Recommended to Quin Ivy, owner of the Norala Sound studio, Sledge arrived with a rudimentary draft of ‘When A Man Loves A Woman’. A timeless single, its simple arrangement hinged on Spooner Oldham’s organ sound and the singer’s homely, nasal intonation. Released in 1966, initially on the Ivy imprint before being licensed to Atlantic Records, it was a huge international hit, topping the US pop chart and setting the tone for Sledge’s subsequent path. A series of emotional, poignant ballads followed, poised between country and soul, but none achieved a similar commercial profile. ‘Warm And Tender Love’ (1966), ‘It Tears Me Up’, ‘Out Of Left Field’ (both 1967) and ‘Take Time To Know Her’ (1968) nonetheless stand among...

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