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Joel Katz, Former Attorney to James Brown, Michael Jackson, Willie Nelson and Many Top Music Executives, Dies at 80
Joel Katz, for decades one of the most powerful attorneys in the music business with a clientele including James Brown and Michael Jackson, has died.
He represented artists ranging from James Brown and Willie Nelson to Michael Jackson and Sen. Orrin Hatch over the years, and oversaw the $300 million purchase of Big Machine Records by Scooter Braun’s Ithaca Holdings in 2018. He resigned from Greenberg Traurig at the end of 2020 and was nominally retired, but continued his work behind the scenes as a top-level player for both artists, also including Justin Timberlake, Jimmy Buffett, Julio Iglesias, George Jones, Tammy Wynette, Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson, Jamie Foxx, George Strait, Kenny Chesney, Little Big Town, TLC, Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, along with the Recording Academy and many executives. Before her ouster after just eight months in the job, Dugan also sent a memo to the Academy’s head of HR expressing concern about the organization’s “exorbitant and unnecessary” legal fees to outside law firms, including Greenberg Traurig, which totaled more than $1 million annually for several years.
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