IN LOVING MEMORY: ISAAC HAYES 1942-2008

Isaac Hayes with his wife Adjowa and son Kwadjo, 2006. Copyright Andrea Zucker/Stax Museum.

WE LOVE YOU ISAAC

As most soul music fans around the world know by now, one of the greatest soul music icons in the world, Isaac Hayes, passed away yesterday, Sunday, August 10, 2008. We here at the Soulsville Foundation are deeply saddened and stunned to have lost one of our favorite people in the world and one of the most avid supporters of the Stax Museum, Stax Music Academy, and The Soulsville Charter School. We will miss Isaac very much and our thoughts go out now to his family, friends, and members of the Stax family.

No arrangements that we are aware of at this time have been planned to memorialize Mr. Hayes.

Please visit our Stax Museum Blog at www.staxmuseumnews.blogspot.com or by clicking on the Blog icon in the center of this site's home page. Read comments from people from all parts of the world and please share comments of your own. Also on the blog is the link to a cover story from Memphis magazine on Mr. Hayes from December 2006.

A little more about Isaac Hayes:

Shortly after graduating from Manassas High School in North Memphis and trying his talent with a few doo-wop groups and performing in area clubs with Mar-Key horn player Floyd Newman, Isaac Hayes found his way to Stax Records, where he teamed with songwriting partner David Porter. The two joined with the members of Booker T. & the MGs as the Stax “Big 6,” a production partnership, where they remained a major influence on most Stax recordings released during the 1960s, co-writing and producing some 200 songs including such classic hits as “Soul Man,” Hold On, I’m Coming,” and “When Something is Wrong with My Baby.”

In the late 1960s, he evolved from working behind the scenes at Stax into a global icon. During this time he recorded, among other albums, Hot Buttered Soul (1969), the soundtrack of Shaft (1971), and Black Moses (1972). They were sensational successes, and Mr. Hayes became the first African-American to win an Academy Award for music for his “Theme From Shaft.” He remained on the Stax roster until the label was forced into involuntary bankruptcy in 1975.

Mr. Hayes continued recording, but from the early 1980s he also concentrated on his film and television career, appearing in more than 60 movies and television shows, including his famed 10-year role as “Chef” on South Park. A devoted philanthropist and honorary King of Ghana, Mr. Hayes built an 8,000-square-foot-school there, NekoTech, which opened in 1998, and focuses on literacy, education, computer technology, and other modern ways to help underprivileged young people in the region. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll of Fame in 2002 and the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2005.