Brown's enormous contribution, particularly to soul and funk music, inspired this article. It will interest anyone interested in entrepreneurship no matter where it appears. His death in December 2006 also got me thinking and researching how it is that he achieved so much in music and the music business, remained relevant for four decades as a celebrity and performer in a business as tough as music, and influenced so many across the globe.

The purpose of this article is to present Brown's achievement from an IP business perspective. This is done by applying the methodology of the Dilanchian KML Framework to the record of Brown's life and work. We'll begin with a short biography. 

A.  Short Biography of James Brown

The early history of African-American music is regional. Styles developed in a region and then spread. Beginning his musical career in Georgia in 1953 after several other jobs, Brown became a singer, performer, dancer, bandleader, musician, songwriter, record producer and music business operator.

All this, without having ever learned to read music, though for music theory and structure he was supported by bandleaders such as Fred Wesley.

All this, despite a life that began in 1933 in poverty born in a one-room shack near Barnswell, South Carolina, raised by distant relatives in a house of ill repute, and with less than a seventh-grade education.

All this, because he was street-wise, with a boxer's agility, and a deal maker's eye for the bottom line in an industry of constant deals to fill bands, bookings, records and promotions.

Brown's parents separated when he was four years old. He did not see his mother for another 20 years. Before he turned six his father put Brown in the custody of a great aunt while he worked in a region nearby. His father never lived in the same house again as Brown. As an adolescent Brown served time for petty theft in Augusta, Georgia. Late in life he returned to his roots and brought his mother and father to live near him in Augusta, Georgia.

It is understandable then that James Brown dedicated his 1986 autobiography with the following words: "For the child deprived of being able to grow up and say 'Momma' and 'Daddy' and have both of them come put their arms around him."

In this article we ask and try to answer the question - What made James Brown financially successful when poor financial returns from the entertainment industry was so typically the lot of African-American artists for most of the 20th century? You can't answer this question if you don't get funk and Brown's originality as a dancer, singer, song writer and band leader.

Brown on originality

Millions got funk and continue to get it. Artistically, Brown influenced musicians, performers and samplers over four decades and is widely touted as holding the record for being the most sampled recording artist. Brown’s drummer, Clyde Stubblefield was responsible for what is said to be the most sampled piece ever, "Funky Drummer". You can hear a portion at Joe Jahnigen’s site and here you’ll find a list of recordings that sample “Funky Drummer”.

Brown's first love was gospel trying to imitate the Golden Gate Quartet and others. He was influenced by preachers, the circus and minstrel shows that came through Augusta. On radio and records he listened to Duke Ellington, Count Basie, rhythm and blues and whatever was around. This did not include listening to country music for which he had a special dislike. He writes in his biography that as his career emerged in the first half of the 1950s the biggest thing in Georgia was Little Richard.

Brown writes that "most Afro-Americans can't sing pop; they may think they can, but they can't. The Platters were the first Afro-American group to really sing pop." In 1956 he recorded "Please Please Please" for Federal, a label of King Records. It went to number 6 on the Billboard Rhythm and Blues chart and stayed on the chart for 19 weeks. Eventually it sold a million copies. The record sales led to more and better paying and bigger gigs and to the pinnacle, The Apollo in Harlem, New York. 

What Brown says in his biography about originality is instructive about musical influences and why it is he put so much effort throughout his life into his hairstyle:

So Brown's ear took him to an equilibrium between Gospel, Soul, Rhythm and Blues and Funk where he could be distinguished from Blues, Country, Rock and Roll, Pop and Disco. Disco annoyed Brown, he felt it was a dumbing down of Funk, taking a Funk track's end "vamp" (his term) and endlessly repeating it. Where Brown's ear went tens of millions of other ears followed.

Brown the bandleader

To maintain control over his band's sound and performance, Brown applied strict discipline to himself and his big band, including avoiding the afflictions of hard drugs and alcohol. He sought constant improvement. On stage he had the tightest band I've ever heard live. He would lift an elbow to start the horn section’s riff, move a hand to call in the drummer’s shuffle and then suddenly twist and freeze signalling the band to stop on cue. He could conduct through subtle body moves. He was a master who built on the shoulders of giants such as his friends and contemporaries which in the 1950s included artists such as Little Richard, Ray Charles and Otis Redding - all born in Georgia. Not surprisingly he saw himself in juxtaposition to Elvis Presley.

Brown the performer 

Significantly, Brown regarded himself as being in show business. Reaching the heights of an emotional ballad he lightened the tone with a famous cape routine, inspired by watching a boxer on television named Gorgeous George. With the cape he mixed tragedy and comedy and took his audience for the ride. He would make repeated slow motion and emotional departures from stage shadowed by a concerned minder trying to place the cape over his shoulders. He would each time allow the cape to fall away or shake it off to return to centre stage and finish the ballad triumphantly. The routine can be read as a pantomime about recovering from love gone wrong. Comfortably seated I saw Brown perform the cape routine at the Horden Pavilion in Sydney in the mid 1980s. It was a hoot. I also saw Little Richard do the same routine in the mid 1970s with a dressing gown which he ultimately threw into the audience. I was in the bear pit below the stage and tussled to get a shred of that dressing gown. I took it home. A couple of weeks later, looking at it in my bedroom, I wondered why I was keeping it. I tossed it. It is such personal memories that make the entertainment industry what it is.  

Show business for Brown meant maintaining a smart look and keeping up the appearance of being a star on and off stage. He tells of keeping the windows rolled up no matter how hot it was in a brand new 1959 red Cadillac with the band inside, all to pretend to any onlookers that the car had air conditioning. 

Brown's position in entertainment business history 

At his height Brown stood in the mid-20th century transition from - radio, big touring bands, ballrooms, and booking agencies for them - to records and record companies, DJs, payola, television and international distribution arrangements. In both eras money made the entertainment world go round.

It was also a transition in the law's application to entertainment. Here's a snapshot as regards recording agreements. In the 1920s Bessie Smith signed a recording contract that was less than one page. In the 1960s Brown was taking on his record company, King Records, in litigation and various tactical manoeuvres seeking a better outcome for himself using the same lawyer as used by the Rolling Stones.

James Brown died on Christmas Day 2006, aged 73. Recalling Blind Lemmon Jefferson's classic 1927 blues song "See that my grave is kept clean", Brown's coffin lay on a cart pulled by two white horses. Follow are three verses from the song thanks to the transcription here :

        Well, there's one kind of favor I'll ask of you,
        Well, there's one kind of favor I'll ask of you,
        There's just one kind of favor I'll ask of you,
        You can see that my grave is kept clean.

        And there's two white horses following me,
        And there's two white horses following me,
        I got two white horses following me,
        Waiting on my burying ground.

        Did you ever hear that coffin sound,
        Have you ever heard that coffin sound,
        Did you ever hear that coffin sound,
        Means another poor boy is under ground.

The horses took Brown to the Apollo, the Harlem venue which featured so hugely in his career from the beginning to the end. In his honour 8,000 people attended.

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