NOTEWORTHY DEATHS

Ramone, record producer for the stars

Phil Ramone, a prolific record producer and engineer who worked with some of the biggest stars of the past 50 years, including Ray Charles, Frank Sinatra, Paul Simon, Billy Joel and Barbra Streisand, died Saturday in Manhattan. He was 79. His death was confirmed by his son Matthew. A cause of death was not immediately released, but Ramone was reported to have been admitted to a Manhattan hospital in late February for treatment of an aortic aneurysm.

In his 2007 memoir, Making Records, the Scenes Behind the Music, written with Charles L. Granata, Ramone detailed decades of recording sessions with superstar artists and defined the role of record producer as being roughly equivalent to that of a movie director, creating and managing an environment in which to coax the best work out of his performers.

He won a total of 14 Grammy Awards, including producer of the year, nonclassical, in 1981, and three for album of the year: Simon’s Still Crazy After All these Years in 1976, Joel’s 52nd Street in 1980, and Charles’ duets album, Genius Loves Company in 2005.

Ramone was born in South Africa and grew up in Brooklyn. His father died when Ramone was young, and his mother worked in a department store. A classical violin prodigy, he studied at Juilliard but soon drifted toward jazz and pop. He apprenticed at a recording studio, and in 1958 co-founded A&R Recording, a studio on West 48th Street in Manhattan.

In addition to his son Matthew, Ramone’s survivors include his sons William and Paul, and his wife, Karen.

Arkansas, Pages 16 on 03/31/2013

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