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[h3]In 1950, they were both teenagers who had moved to L.A. from the East Coast. [/h3]

Mike Stoller loved jazz but played with dance bands while attending College. Through a friend he met Jerry Leiber, a student at Fairfax High, with an after-school job at a record store.

They spent that summer writing songs that reflected their love of black pop music, and soon Jimmy Witherspoon had recorded and performed their 'Real Ugly Woman' in concert.

Three years later, their 'Hound Dog' (Big Mama Thornton) prepared the way for rock and roll. Leiber and Stoller moved through the early 1950s from r&b to rock, without realising that this change was about to produce a new youth culture and undreamed of wealth.

A major source of Leiber and Stoller's success and power was their ability to bridge both racial barriers and musical genres. Their funny and funky contributions to the Coasters stand in contrast to their ethereal 'Dance With Me' (The Drifters, 1959) and the gospel 'Stand By Me' (Ben E. King, 1961).

The breadth is even evident in their association with their most famous single partner, [urlnew=http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_home/116:0/Elvis_Presley.htm]Elvis Presley[/urlnew].

Leiber and Stoller relocated to New York to be closer to the virtual teen pop factory, centered in and around the Brill Building. They effectively strengthened the foundations of rock, by combining the functions of songwriters and producers, and daring to experiment with effects, and they took the young producer, [urlnew=http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_home/811:0/Phil_Spector.htm]Phil Spector[/urlnew], under their wing.

Having formed their first label, Spark, during the early pre-rock stage of their career, Leiber and Stoller began shifting more of their attention from writing to producing, with their formation of Red Bird in 1964.

The duo relaxed from their hectic pace of making records in the late 1950s and early 1960s, reappearing briefly to produce 'Stuck In the Middle With You' for Stealers Wheel, in 1972.

In the late 1970s, A&M records recruited them to write and produce an album for young British sensation Elkie Brooks. The album Two Days Away (1977) proved a major success in the UK and most of Europe. Their composition "Pearl's A Singer" (written with Ralph Dino and John Sembello) became a huge hit for Brooks, and remains her signature tune to this day. The collaboration proved so successful, they produced another album for her, Live and Learn, in 1979.

They won Grammy awards for "Is That All There Is?" and for the cast album of Smokey Joe's Cafe, a 1995 Broadway musical based on their work.
Leiber and Stoller biography

Leiber and Stoller biography

Leiber and Stoller biography