Died On This Date (September 15, 2008) Warren Wayne Brown / Former VP of MCA Music
themusicsover Warren Wayne Brown
1916 – September 15, 2008
Warren Wayne Brown was a one-time vice president of MCA Music as well as brother of jazz band leader, Les Brown. After WWII, Brown who had played the trombone in the Navy band, went to work as a song plugger for Leeds Music. When MCA purchased Leeds, Brown moved to Los Angeles to become VP. He retired in 1981 and passed away of an undisclosed illness on September 15, 2008.
Jamie Cohen was a one-time A&R man at Columbia Records and EMI Records, though he began his career in the mid ’70s as a product manager at A&M Records. He was also a musician. Cohen died of a heart attack at the age of 55.
During a career that spanned over 50 years, Bob Greenberg held executive posts at Warner Bros., United Artists, Mirage and Atlantic Records. While at these labels, he helped build the careeres of such legendary artists as Led Zeppelin, Whitesnake, AC/DC, Genesis, Aretha Franklin and the Rolling Stones. Greenberg suffered a stroke on September 10, 2009 and died as a result the next day.
Skip Miller was a respected music industry executive whose career spanned almost 40 years. Miller started his career at in the promotion department of Motown Records, where he eventually became President. After the company was sold in 1988, Miller moved over to RCA Records as Sr. Vice President. In recent years, Miller ran his own management company, Panda Entertainment Group. Skip Miller died of a heart attack at a Los Angeles hospital.
Rich Cunningham was a respected union organizer and one-time head of his own label, Happy Days Records, which he founded in 1995 while still in college. The punk label, named after the popular ’70s television program whose lead character shared the same name as Cunningham, was the one-time home to such acts as Ink & Dagger and Hot Water Music. In later years, Cunningham formed New Labor, an organization that helped low-income and immigrant workers. He had suffered from colon cancer since 2005, but cause of death was not immediately released. He was 32.