Dick James

• 1. Introduction

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  Dick James held a telephone receiver to his record player on the 27th of November 1962. He played "Please Please Me" down the line to Philip Jones, the producer of the television show Thank Your Lucky Stars. By the end of the call, The Beatles had secured their first nationwide television appearance. James had not signed them, not produced them, and not managed them. He was their music publisher. That role placed him at the center of one of British pop's most enduring disputes over ownership, betrayal, and the value of a song. Born Isaac Vapnick in the East End of London in 1920, James spent his early years as a singer. That career would leave almost no trace of the publisher he would become. How he got there begins not with contracts but with a very different kind of stage.

• 2. From Dance Halls to Radio

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  His father was a kosher butcher. In the family's world of Polish Jewish immigrant London, a career in music was an unlikely path. Yet by his early teens James was already singing with North London dance bands, and by the age of seventeen he was a regular vocalist at the Cricklewood Palais.

  His first radio broadcast came in 1940, with the Henry Hall band. Two years later, the war interrupted everything. James joined the army in 1942. After the peace, he returned to performing, working with leading bands including Geraldo's. He became an original member of The Stargazers, a popular vocal group in the early 1950s. Through that decade, his name appeared regularly in the top ten of the Melody Maker vocal charts alongside Dickie Valentine and Frank Holder.

  James sang the theme songs for The Adventures of Robin Hood and The Buccaneers, two drama series produced in England in the 1950s. He also reached the UK singles charts: "Robin Hood" climbed to number 14 in 1956, and "Garden of Eden" reached number 18 in 1957.

  As his singing career tapered off, Ron Goodwin introduced him to George Martin, then the assistant A&R director at Parlophone. That introduction, made in the early 1950s, connected James to the business side of the music industry before he had ever issued a publishing contract.

• 3. Northern Songs

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  In 1958, James joined Sidney Bron Music as a song-plugger. He left in 1961 to found Dick James Music. The company was still small when Brian Epstein reached out in late 1962. What followed transformed both men. Epstein and James established Northern Songs Ltd., a company built to publish the original compositions of John Lennon and Paul McCartney. George Harrison and Ringo Starr were also signed to Northern Songs as songwriters, though neither renewed their contracts in 1968. Dick James Music administered the entire operation.

  James published other acts during the 1960s as well. He handled Billy J. Kramer and Gerry and the Pacemakers. He and Epstein also moved together on another deal: they offered a singing contract to Bobby Willis, who turned it down at the firm insistence of his future wife, Cilla Black. Willis later sang as a backing vocalist on Black's recording of "You're My World." James was living in Anson Road, Cricklewood, during these years.

  By the late 1960s, the relationship with The Beatles had broken down completely. When James sold Northern Songs in 1969, he made no offer to let Lennon and McCartney purchase control of the company. They regarded it as a betrayal. The sale profited James substantially. The band never again held the rights to their own songs, a consequence that would reach far beyond 1969.

• 4. Elton John and DJM Records

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  James signed Earl Okin in 1965. Okin was preoccupied with his university studies, which left James looking for other artists. The answer arrived from within his own building. Stephen James, who had worked alongside his father since 1963, had established recording studios as part of Dick James Music. In 1967, Stephen discovered that a young pianist named Reginald Dwight had been using those studios late at night, without permission. Stephen brought Dwight to his father's attention.

  Dick James signed Dwight, who had not yet adopted the name Elton John, along with Dwight's lyricist Bernie Taupin. Both were unknowns in 1967. Stephen had already been working toward a record label. He had started This Productions, a record production company, before formally establishing DJM Records in 1969. Every Elton John release up to 1976 appeared on that label. DJM also released music by Jasper Carrott, the RAH Band, Danny Kirwan, and John Inman.

  Elton John founded his own label, Rocket, in 1973. His business dealings with James did not end there. In 1982, John became involved in a court case with James over royalties. By June 1985, the music magazine NME was reporting that John was suing James for the rights to his earlier recordings. The case found in James's favor. John lost.

  James died in London on the 1st of February 1986 at the age of 65, of a heart attack. Dick James Music was subsequently acquired by PolyGram. When Universal Music Group later bought PolyGram, the catalog passed with it. The songs James spent decades acquiring now belong to Universal Music Publishing Group, a catalog that spans everything from the early Beatles era through Elton John's DJM years.