Doug Morris
Doug Morris is an American record executive. He was chairman and chief executive officer of Universal Music Group from 1995 to 2011 and Sony Music Entertainment from 2011 to 2017. In 2018, he founded the record label 12Tone, which was acquired by Warner Records in 2021.
Life and career
Early life and career
Born to Jewish parents, Morris grew up in Woodmere, Long Island, in the state of New York. His father, Walter Bernard Morris, was a lawyer, and his mother was a ballet instructor. He is a graduate of Columbia University. He began a career in the music industry as a songwriter for Robert Mellin, Inc., a music publisher. In 1965, Morris produced the self-titled debut album by the then-unknown garage band the Barbarians, which spawned two hit singles: "Are You a Boy or Are You a Girl" and "Moulty", the latter of which Morris co-wrote. Morris wrote "Sweet Talkin' Guy", a 1966 hit for The Chiffons, and produced the hit "Smokin' In the Boys Room" for Brownsville Station. After joining Laurie Records as a songwriter and producer in 1965, Morris eventually became vice-president and general manager of the record label. He later started his own label, Big Tree Records, which was acquired by Atlantic Records in 1974, which led to Morris becoming president of Atco Records and an association with Warner Music.Morris became president of Atlantic Records in 1980, and became co-chairman and co-CEO of the Atlantic Recording Group, alongside Ahmet Ertegun, in 1990. Morris played an integral role in making Atlantic the leading company in the Warner Music Group. In 1994, Morris shifted to the position of president and chief operating officer of Warner Music U.S., and was soon named chairman. Morris lost an executive battle at Warner leading to his departure from Warner Music in 1995.
Career at Universal Music Group
Morris began working with MCA Records in July 1995 by forming a joint venture record label, which became Universal Records when Morris was appointed chairman and CEO of MCA Music Entertainment Group in November 1995. The company was renamed Universal Music Group the following year. He was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame; his ceremony was held on January 26, 2010, at the corner of Hollywood and Vine.Morris was heavily criticized by music journalists for his approach to streaming services, especially the infamous PressPlay.
Lucian Grainge replaced Morris as CEO on January 1, 2011, and later replaced him as chairman on March 9, 2011.
Sony Music Entertainment chairman and CEO
Morris became chairman and CEO of Sony Music Entertainment on July 1, 2011. After Morris' arrival, Sony Music restructured two of its label groups. The RCA/Jive Label Group had been split in half, being separated from the Jive Label Group. Peter Edge was promoted to CEO of the RCA Music Group. L.A. Reid became the chairman and CEO of Epic Records shortly after Morris' arrival. Some Jive artists have been moved to Epic while others have been moved to the RCA. In addition to splitting the RCA/Jive Label Group, the Columbia/Epic Label Group was also split. In October 2011 Morris announced that Mel Lewinter had been appointed executive vice president of Label Strategy at Sony Music. On April 1, 2017, he was replaced as CEO of Sony Music Entertainment by Rob Stringer, who was the CEO of Columbia Records.12Tone Music Group
In 2018, Morris founded the label 12Tone Music Group. His first signing to the label was American rapper Anderson.Paak. The label's assets were acquired by Warner Music Group in 2021.Founder of VEVO
Morris's progressive digital strategies led him to become the first media executive to monetize online music videos, essentially helping to create the music video-on-demand market online.As the founder of VEVO, Morris partnered with Google chairman Eric Schmidt to launch the new premium music video and entertainment service in late 2009. Within its first month of launch, VEVO amassed an unprecedented 35 million unique viewers in the U.S., instantly making it the #1 music entertainment destination on the Web, according to comScore.