Alan Freed

Albert James "Alan" Freed (December 15, 1921 – January 20, 1965) was an American disc jockey. He also produced and promoted large traveling concerts with various acts, helping to spread the importance of rock and roll music throughout North America, including popularizing the term "rock and roll".

In 1986, Freed was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. His "role in breaking down racial barriers in U.S. pop culture in the 1950s, by leading white and black kids to listen to the same music, put the radio personality 'at the vanguard' and made him 'a really important figure'", according to the executive director.

Freed was born to a Welsh-American mother, Maude Palmer, and a Russian Jewish immigrant father, Charles S. Freed, in Windber, Pennsylvania. The 1930 Federal Census has the Freeds living at 550 East Seventh Street in Salem, Ohio, with Charles listing his place of birth as Alsace-Lorraine and his language Lithuanian. Freed attended Salem High School, graduating in 1940. While Freed was in high school, he formed a band called the Sultans of Swing in which he played the trombone. Freed's initial ambition was to be a bandleader; however, an ear infection put an end to that dream.

While attending Ohio State University, Freed became interested in radio. Freed served in the US Army during World War II and worked as a DJ on Armed Forces Radio. Soon after World War II, Freed landed broadcasting jobs at smaller radio stations, including WKST (New Castle, Pennsylvania); WKBN (Youngstown, Ohio); and WAKR (Akron, Ohio), where, in 1945, he became a local favorite for playing hot jazz and pop recordings.

Freed was the first radio disc jockey and concert producer who frequently played and promoted rock and roll; he popularized the phrase "rock and roll" on mainstream radio in the early 1950s. The term "rock and roll" already existed in the early 1940s, but it remained obscure.^{[citation needed]} For example, one of the term's earliest uses was by a music critic and record reviewer for Billboard named Maurie Orodenker (1908-1993). In the May 30, 1942 issue (page 25) of Billboard, in his review of the song "Rock Me" by Thomas A. Dorsey (1899-1993) (which song appeared on a record released in May 1942 by Lucky Millinder and His Orchestra with Rosetta Tharpe), Orodenker described the vocals of Sister Rosetta Tharpe as "rock-and-roll spiritual singing."

Several sources suggest that he first discovered the term (as a euphemism for sexual intercourse) on the record "Sixty Minute Man" by Billy Ward and his Dominoes. The lyrics include the line, "I rock 'em, roll 'em all night long", however, Freed did not accept that inspiration (or that meaning of the expression) in interviews, and explained his view of the term as follows: "Rock 'n roll is really swing with a modern name. It began on the levees and plantations, took in folk songs, and features blues and rhythm".

He helped bridge the gap of segregation among young teenage Americans, presenting music by black artists (rather than cover versions by white artists) on his radio program, and arranging live concerts attended by racially mixed audiences. Freed appeared in several motion pictures as himself. In the 1956 film Rock, Rock, Rock, Freed tells the audience that "rock and roll is a river of music which has absorbed many streams: rhythm and blues, jazz, ragtime, cowboy songs, country songs, folk songs. All have contributed greatly to the big beat."

In June 1945, Alan Freed joined WAKR (1590 AM) in Akron, Ohio, and quickly became a star announcer. Dubbed "The Old Knucklehead", Freed had up to five hours of airtime every day on the station by June 1948: the daytime Jukebox Serenade, the early-evening Wax Works and the nightly Request Review. Freed also had brief run-ins with management and was at one point temporarily fired for violating studio rules and failing to show up for work for several days in a row.