The American record industry of the 1950s and 1960s boasted a cast of formidable personalities: Ahmet Ertegun (Atlantic), the Chess brothers (Chess), the Bihari brothers (Modern), Berry Gordy (Motown), Phil Spector (Philles), and Sydney Nathan (King). Ambition and a keen sense for business often clashed with ethical lines and far-sighted vision. Humble origins fed their drive. Jim Stewart, however, was not cut from that same cloth. Yet the Stax Records he helped build would rival any of those legendary labels. In fact, for many, Stax stands tall above Motown and Atlantic as a defining force in American music. The debate over that ranking is fierce. Stewart passed away this week at the age of 92.
I barely saw black culture until adulthood, says Stewart in rare quotes cited by Peter Guralnick in the narrative of the genre. He recalls being unfamiliar with Atlantic, Chess, or Imperial when he started. He had no grand plan to launch Stax; his driving aim was simply to involve himself with music. That open-ended motive helped Stax become a place where big things happened. Black and white musicians collaborated naturally in Memphis. Though the city remained racially segregated in memory and in practice, the work on the ground blurred those lines.
Bank clerk
A bank teller and amateur violinist, Stewart, born in Middleton, Tennessee in 1930, founded the Satellite label in 1957 to record country and rockabilly acts. His sister Estelle Axton, who died in 2004, mortgaged her home to buy an Ampex 300 tape recorder. They converted an old Capitol cinema into a studio in a Memphis neighborhood shifting from white to Black as Stax began. The venture grew from Stewart and Axton.
A local radio DJ and steadfast supporter, Ruffus Thomas visited the new studio in 1960 to record the single “Cause I Love You” with his daughter Carla. The track found moderate success, and Stax secured a national distribution deal with a major label through Atlantic.
The house band included Booker T. Jones on keyboards, Steve Cropper on guitar, Donald “D.C.” Dunn on bass, and Al Jackson on drums. Booker T. and the MGs flourished with instrumentals while the quartet—two Black, two white—embodied Stax’s informal ethos. They built a distinctive sound from a movie theater turned recording venue, and the studio’s acoustics fed that energy. The group helped popularize artists like Ollie & the Nightingales, Wilson Pickett, Eddie Floyd, Sam & Dave, Isaac Hayes, the Staple Singers, and even Otis Redding. Stax became the cradle of southern soul and a beacon for a generation seeking authentic expression from Memphis to the nation.
Riots, separation and bankruptcy
The assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in April 1968 sparked riots that reached the Stax campus, though the headquarters remained intact near the Lorraine Motel. A similar scenario unfolded at a Detroit barber shop. In a parallel thread, George Clinton was quietly shaping the Parliament and the Parliaments, laying groundwork for funk’s future.
Redding’s sudden death in a plane crash in December 1967, coupled with disputes over a contract previously identified by Rick Hall at Fame Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, underscored the fragility of Stax’s arrangements with Atlantic. The fine print of their deal proved financially harmful to the Memphis label.
Stax’s final chapter arrived at the Los Angeles Festival of 1972. It marked a high point before the label’s decline, culminating in bankruptcy in 1975. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame later acknowledged Stax’s influence, though the ceremony in 2002 fell short of expectations for many of the artists involved, with the heads of the label passing the torch to newer generations rather than attending themselves. The story remains a testament to how a unexpected mix of talent, geography, and timing can redefine an entire music era.