R.I.P.: Barney Ales, Helped Make Motown A Powerhouse

Berry Gordy Jr and Barney Ales

Barney Ales, a natural-born salesman whose charisma and aggressive instincts helped turn Motown Records into a music-industry powerhouse, died Friday of natural causes in Malibu, California, his family said. He was 85, USAToday reports.

Though he wasn't a household name, the white executive was a pivotal figure at the black-owned label, helping penetrate key power corridors of the industry establishment while overseeing Motown's sales division in the 1960s. He later served three years as company president.

Born Baldassare Ales, he grew up in northwest Detroit, the son of a Sicilian-native father and a mother from northern Michigan. Having started as a stock boy with Capitol Records, he eventually rose to manage that company’s Detroit branch, and was running his own record-distribution firm in 1961 when he was tapped by Berry Gordy Jr. to head up sales and promotion for the fledgling Motown.

The street-savvy wheeler-and-dealer proved critical to crossover success for Motown, which had already run up a string of hits on the R&B charts: Within months of his arrival, Motown landed its first No. 1 pop hit, the Marvelettes' "Please Mr. Postman."

Assembling a diverse staff of Detroit music-biz veterans, Ales gave Motown an entree to the industry establishment — the white-dominated record distributors and radio promoters behind the scenes who could quietly make or break a mainstream hit.

His efforts helped Motown’s black artists — figures such as the Supremes, Marvin Gaye and Smokey Robinson — become some of the biggest pop stars of the era.

“I just thought Barney was the greatest salesperson in the world, and he had, like, the United Nations in his sales department,” Gordy said. “When he came in, he said he would build me a great team. I wanted to sell music to all people: whites, blacks, Jews, gentiles, the cops and the robbers.”